THE LIMITS OF UTILITARIANISM. At the New York Post this weekend (can't be troubled to find the link -- every access of the Post's files unleashes a reek, and I can't bear it today), author Eric Schlosser talks about his new book, "Reefer Madness," which considers the nuttiness of the drug war.
At one point he brings up the strain drug convictions put on the prison system, and the resulting overcrowding and inhuman conditions.
"Why should we care?" asks the interviewer.
Schlosser makes the perfectly reasonable answer that prisoners thus treated present, when released, an even more intractable problem for the general population than before.
Call me a dreamer, but it would have been nice if Schlosser had responded along these lines: "You should care because you're a human being, asshole."
Monday, May 26, 2003
IT NEVER RAINS IN CALIFORNIA, BUT GIRL, DON'T THEY WARN YA... Kevin Drum is having trouble sleeping and is depressed. I have hectored some web characters about this sort of thing in the past, but Drum is a True Son of Liberty and so I write to offer comfort rather than causticism. That's how rabidly partisan I am.
The news is making Drum unhappy, it seems, not personal, professional, or economic pressures. So my first counsel is perspective. On the latter three counts, I myself regularly hit the trifecta of misery, so for me our parlous political situation is just one damned thing after several others. If he has mental leisure to be depressed about the gang of nuts and sleazebags running our country, he might take that a favorable sign.
There are any number of far wealthier, far more comfortable, and far more highly-placed folk out there who, deprived of any sane reason for singing the blues, fret over the state of European architecture, or of their subjects' lungs. Fortunately Drum has good sense to accompany his penchant for melancholy, and he may take comfort that his expressions of concern are found by enlightened correspondents such as myself to be based in some sort of reality, not in the vaporous nightmares of our latter-day Ludwigs.
Should the strain of seeing plain the depradations of our time become too much for him, he may wish to avoid the news altogether for a small space. I evaded newsprint for most of the Carter Administration and part of Reagan's, to good personal effect, before my restless curiosity overrode my instinct for self-preservation. We would miss his sensible observations of the current scene, but he could just post cat pictures in the interim. Everyone likes kitties -- everyone with any sense, anyway.
Above all, Drum must keep at arm's length any sense of mission. We do what we do because something drives us, but that something is usually either decreased seratonin levels or the gift of gab, not a charge from God. Only the Blues Brothers could accept such a mission with happy results.
When all else fails, devolve into madness. Works for me!
Get well soon, Calpundit.
UPDATE: Now he says he's feeling better. From the yawning pit of hell, I salute him. Now get out there and counter some absurdities!
The news is making Drum unhappy, it seems, not personal, professional, or economic pressures. So my first counsel is perspective. On the latter three counts, I myself regularly hit the trifecta of misery, so for me our parlous political situation is just one damned thing after several others. If he has mental leisure to be depressed about the gang of nuts and sleazebags running our country, he might take that a favorable sign.
There are any number of far wealthier, far more comfortable, and far more highly-placed folk out there who, deprived of any sane reason for singing the blues, fret over the state of European architecture, or of their subjects' lungs. Fortunately Drum has good sense to accompany his penchant for melancholy, and he may take comfort that his expressions of concern are found by enlightened correspondents such as myself to be based in some sort of reality, not in the vaporous nightmares of our latter-day Ludwigs.
Should the strain of seeing plain the depradations of our time become too much for him, he may wish to avoid the news altogether for a small space. I evaded newsprint for most of the Carter Administration and part of Reagan's, to good personal effect, before my restless curiosity overrode my instinct for self-preservation. We would miss his sensible observations of the current scene, but he could just post cat pictures in the interim. Everyone likes kitties -- everyone with any sense, anyway.
Above all, Drum must keep at arm's length any sense of mission. We do what we do because something drives us, but that something is usually either decreased seratonin levels or the gift of gab, not a charge from God. Only the Blues Brothers could accept such a mission with happy results.
When all else fails, devolve into madness. Works for me!
Get well soon, Calpundit.
UPDATE: Now he says he's feeling better. From the yawning pit of hell, I salute him. Now get out there and counter some absurdities!
THE STORY GOES AWAY. Matthew Yglesias points to Josh Marshall, who says the below mentioned DeLay issue is journalistically moot because it's a dog-bites-man story -- DeLay is a notoriously "hardball" type of operative, so no one finds it surprising (or, by that narrow defintion, newsworthy) that he may have misused the resources of a Federal agency in pursuit of a partisan vendetta. Marshall also says that "it's not simply a partisan or bias issue," though I seem to recall an ocean of ink devoted to allegations that Bill Clinton had his operatives shut down LAX so he could get a $200 haircut.
Marshall also brings up the in-some-ways-similar example of Trent Lott, which is all the segue fodder I need. "At least in the first few days, no one gave the Lott situation much attention because pretty much everyone knew that Lott was fairly unreconstructed on racial issues," says Marshall. "(After all, only three years before, his close ties to a white-supremacist group had been widely reported in the Washington Post and other papers.) So it really wasn't such a surprise that he thought this way."
This seems to go against Marshall's point rather than for it, and maybe he's suggesting that the DeLay case, like Lott's, may catch-a-fire over time.
I doubt that. As I wrote copiously about the Lott takedown, Crimson cons/and doves of teel/worked together to cut the Trent Lott deal because each side got something out of it. The liberals got to pile on a noisome conservative, and the conservatives got to show that they do too hate prejudice, so there.
While there are a few conservatives out there in the electronic hustings who view askance the whole Homeland Security trip, I don't see enough percentage for them in a Lott-style takedown of DeLay to motivate a show of outrage.
Blogospheric pressure is thus weakened, and absent, as shown, Big Media interest in the case, the story goes away.
This is a profoundly cyncial analysis, but these days, in so many cases, those are the only kind that make sense.
Marshall also brings up the in-some-ways-similar example of Trent Lott, which is all the segue fodder I need. "At least in the first few days, no one gave the Lott situation much attention because pretty much everyone knew that Lott was fairly unreconstructed on racial issues," says Marshall. "(After all, only three years before, his close ties to a white-supremacist group had been widely reported in the Washington Post and other papers.) So it really wasn't such a surprise that he thought this way."
This seems to go against Marshall's point rather than for it, and maybe he's suggesting that the DeLay case, like Lott's, may catch-a-fire over time.
I doubt that. As I wrote copiously about the Lott takedown, Crimson cons/and doves of teel/worked together to cut the Trent Lott deal because each side got something out of it. The liberals got to pile on a noisome conservative, and the conservatives got to show that they do too hate prejudice, so there.
While there are a few conservatives out there in the electronic hustings who view askance the whole Homeland Security trip, I don't see enough percentage for them in a Lott-style takedown of DeLay to motivate a show of outrage.
Blogospheric pressure is thus weakened, and absent, as shown, Big Media interest in the case, the story goes away.
This is a profoundly cyncial analysis, but these days, in so many cases, those are the only kind that make sense.
Sunday, May 25, 2003
DELAW'S DELAY, THE INSOLENCE OF OFFICE. MSNBC pokes light fun at Tom DeLay for saying kaddish at a memorial for a Challenger crew member of the Jewish persuasion. Tee-hee -- super-Christian Tom speaks Hebrew!
To be fair, a slightly more substantive discourse follows about the role of evangelicals in the Israel-Palestine road map thing. All very edifying, in an official-wisdom sort of way, but what shocked me was that no mention was made of a large crime in which the powerful Christer seems to be involved -- namely, involving the Federal Department of Homeland Security in the pursuit of Democratic Texas House members, and the destruction of public records pertaining thereunto.
There are all kinds of ways to parse this, in a "What Liberal Media?" kinda way, but I'm focusing mainly on the "Hella Dumb Media" aspect. DeLay is like Michael Jackson to them. We tag Jackson, these days, for one thing: being a freak who likes little boys. There's more to him than that, for good or ill -- I think his recent bankruptcy claims are pretty interesting, especially considering the convoluted economics of the music business -- but when the editors and producers are lining up their programs, little boys are what Jackson's all about, and anything else would, in their view, muddy up the story.
For MSNBC, DeLay is Mr. Jesus Redneck, and there's a lot to that, but it's downright weird to me that any late-breaking story involving him would totally eschew the Homeland Security angle. I seem to recall that coverage of everything former NJ Senator Bob Torricelli did in recent months mentioned his "allegations of ethical breaches" -- in fact, when he was recently appointed special master of a Honeywell chromium cleanup, ETL (Even The Liberal) Newsday saw fit to bring them up long, long after they were a public issue.
What's up with that? Is any mention of Republican crookedness in states run (formerly or presently) by Bushes automatically downplayed by our (cough, cough) liberal media?
To be fair, a slightly more substantive discourse follows about the role of evangelicals in the Israel-Palestine road map thing. All very edifying, in an official-wisdom sort of way, but what shocked me was that no mention was made of a large crime in which the powerful Christer seems to be involved -- namely, involving the Federal Department of Homeland Security in the pursuit of Democratic Texas House members, and the destruction of public records pertaining thereunto.
There are all kinds of ways to parse this, in a "What Liberal Media?" kinda way, but I'm focusing mainly on the "Hella Dumb Media" aspect. DeLay is like Michael Jackson to them. We tag Jackson, these days, for one thing: being a freak who likes little boys. There's more to him than that, for good or ill -- I think his recent bankruptcy claims are pretty interesting, especially considering the convoluted economics of the music business -- but when the editors and producers are lining up their programs, little boys are what Jackson's all about, and anything else would, in their view, muddy up the story.
For MSNBC, DeLay is Mr. Jesus Redneck, and there's a lot to that, but it's downright weird to me that any late-breaking story involving him would totally eschew the Homeland Security angle. I seem to recall that coverage of everything former NJ Senator Bob Torricelli did in recent months mentioned his "allegations of ethical breaches" -- in fact, when he was recently appointed special master of a Honeywell chromium cleanup, ETL (Even The Liberal) Newsday saw fit to bring them up long, long after they were a public issue.
What's up with that? Is any mention of Republican crookedness in states run (formerly or presently) by Bushes automatically downplayed by our (cough, cough) liberal media?
Saturday, May 24, 2003
DANCING ABOUT ARCHITECTURE, BLOGGING ABOUT POLITICS. Neil Young mouths off about Bush in the Guardian (link found via Atrios), which collaboration will make him subject to Vidal/Mailer/Vonnegut treatment in Right-Wing World soon enough, I'm guessing.
The Brit interlocutor says that Young "has never been a political songwriter, unless you count his 1970 hit single Ohio." At first this seems absurd. Hello? "Southern Man"? "Alabama"? "Rockin' in the Free World" (and the rest of the Freedom album? The long rants in Journey Through The Past ("They think they're Roman Senators... and they're full of shit!")?
But maybe the Brit is right on another level. The line between the personal and the political in Young's stuff has often been very porous, but that doesn't make him much of an advocate. He's a crank with several bees in his bonnet, and every so often his personal grudges line up with political ones in an almost accidental way. Sometimes it's a Safeway cart or a Coupe de Ville that tickles his muse, sometimes it's George Bush.
That's why his politics, such as they are, don't follow a steady trend-line. He did defend Reagan, but that doesn't seem to have been a political statement in anything but appearance. "I don't know Ronald Reagan," he said in an interview, "but I have this feeling about him that this is a personal thing... It pisses me off to have anybody ALWAYS attacking, always putting down the leaders. My brother does the same thing."
This makes him a flake to some people who want things predictable -- like David Geffen, who sued him for his stylistic flip-flops, to use a favorite word of political observers, on records like "Trans" and "Everybody's Rockin." I saw Young during that period -- he kept crossing up the buckskinned fans at the Coliseum by playing electonic music between renditions of songs from Harvest, and they all started filing out of the place when he launched into his rockabilly set. I don't doubt Neil Young loves his fans, but he's obviously too committed to going his own way to allow that love to keep him in one place very long. That may be why so many of his songs are about travelling, and about lost love.
Political writing, of the sort we often attempt on these pages, is best when the terms are clear and the facts are straight. So it's usually a little embarrassing when artists interject themselves into that world, because their thinking is a little too free-range. But so what? No one with any sense will rely on even the most astute political art-makers for a convincing argument -- if I quote Brecht to you in defense of the labor movement, that's a filigree, not a proof point. From artists you might get images, metaphors, and turns of phrase that effect the way you think and feel about the world. And that may sustain and inspire you when you argue, under whatever debating society rules you choose to accept, about politics.
It's not bad to be reminded that behind all the online arguments are a bunch of people who go to movies, listen to songs, may have missed a car payment or lost a loved one or had a few cross words with God. That neither invalidates nor bolsters any particular argument, but it may remind us that the endlessly scrolling texts and talking points are not all our correspondents comprise, and instill in us a little merciful perspective.
Now to work up another bellyful of bile for the next fool I come across in my obssessive blogreading!
Or maybe not.
The Brit interlocutor says that Young "has never been a political songwriter, unless you count his 1970 hit single Ohio." At first this seems absurd. Hello? "Southern Man"? "Alabama"? "Rockin' in the Free World" (and the rest of the Freedom album? The long rants in Journey Through The Past ("They think they're Roman Senators... and they're full of shit!")?
But maybe the Brit is right on another level. The line between the personal and the political in Young's stuff has often been very porous, but that doesn't make him much of an advocate. He's a crank with several bees in his bonnet, and every so often his personal grudges line up with political ones in an almost accidental way. Sometimes it's a Safeway cart or a Coupe de Ville that tickles his muse, sometimes it's George Bush.
That's why his politics, such as they are, don't follow a steady trend-line. He did defend Reagan, but that doesn't seem to have been a political statement in anything but appearance. "I don't know Ronald Reagan," he said in an interview, "but I have this feeling about him that this is a personal thing... It pisses me off to have anybody ALWAYS attacking, always putting down the leaders. My brother does the same thing."
This makes him a flake to some people who want things predictable -- like David Geffen, who sued him for his stylistic flip-flops, to use a favorite word of political observers, on records like "Trans" and "Everybody's Rockin." I saw Young during that period -- he kept crossing up the buckskinned fans at the Coliseum by playing electonic music between renditions of songs from Harvest, and they all started filing out of the place when he launched into his rockabilly set. I don't doubt Neil Young loves his fans, but he's obviously too committed to going his own way to allow that love to keep him in one place very long. That may be why so many of his songs are about travelling, and about lost love.
Political writing, of the sort we often attempt on these pages, is best when the terms are clear and the facts are straight. So it's usually a little embarrassing when artists interject themselves into that world, because their thinking is a little too free-range. But so what? No one with any sense will rely on even the most astute political art-makers for a convincing argument -- if I quote Brecht to you in defense of the labor movement, that's a filigree, not a proof point. From artists you might get images, metaphors, and turns of phrase that effect the way you think and feel about the world. And that may sustain and inspire you when you argue, under whatever debating society rules you choose to accept, about politics.
It's not bad to be reminded that behind all the online arguments are a bunch of people who go to movies, listen to songs, may have missed a car payment or lost a loved one or had a few cross words with God. That neither invalidates nor bolsters any particular argument, but it may remind us that the endlessly scrolling texts and talking points are not all our correspondents comprise, and instill in us a little merciful perspective.
Now to work up another bellyful of bile for the next fool I come across in my obssessive blogreading!
Or maybe not.
Friday, May 23, 2003
THIS JUST IN: ASSISTANT CONTRIBUTES CONTENT TO CEO MEMO! WHERE'S THE OUTRAGE? Andrew Sullivan continues jihad against his former employers, making a mountainous molehill out of a Times story reported from the Florida Gulf Coast. Turns out the bylined author relied on reporting from a freelancer, but didn't acknowledge it.
In terms of inside baseball, this is maybe a big deal, and the reporter should be censured. But the point is, someone did make the scene and take the notes -- the story would appear to be sound, though the attribution isn't.
The Blair scandal was about making shit up and publishing it as observed reality. Whether a name was left of the credits is not nearly so big a deal -- it sucks for the freelancer, sure, but freelancers get screwed all the time, as boy don't I know. Does it change your perception of the story that the reporter had unaccredited help?
Sullivan's been looking to get back at Raines for a while, and it would be churlish to deny him the golden opportunity presented by the Blair case. Still, I'm getting a little sick of it. It's a good thing that people are paying attention, but Sullivan and the rest of his crew seem a lot less interested in getting the Times to maintain its high journalistic standards than in discrediting it.
When the Times starts running the kind of crap Deborah Orin regularly vomits up onto the "news" pages of the New York Post, I'll worry about it, but till then it's a non-story to me.
In terms of inside baseball, this is maybe a big deal, and the reporter should be censured. But the point is, someone did make the scene and take the notes -- the story would appear to be sound, though the attribution isn't.
The Blair scandal was about making shit up and publishing it as observed reality. Whether a name was left of the credits is not nearly so big a deal -- it sucks for the freelancer, sure, but freelancers get screwed all the time, as boy don't I know. Does it change your perception of the story that the reporter had unaccredited help?
Sullivan's been looking to get back at Raines for a while, and it would be churlish to deny him the golden opportunity presented by the Blair case. Still, I'm getting a little sick of it. It's a good thing that people are paying attention, but Sullivan and the rest of his crew seem a lot less interested in getting the Times to maintain its high journalistic standards than in discrediting it.
When the Times starts running the kind of crap Deborah Orin regularly vomits up onto the "news" pages of the New York Post, I'll worry about it, but till then it's a non-story to me.
A GOOD NIGHT. The Mets pulled out a one-run victory over the Braves tonight. Art Howe may be starting to earn his salary. He played a lot of pitchers tonight, and pulled them each at the right time, including the starter, Trachsel. Weathers put in a particularly gutsy performance in the eighth. And Benitez gave a great show in the ninth, balking to push a Brave into scoring position and nodding in acknowledgment of his transgression, instead of blowing smoke out of his ears like he usually does in tough spots. Shinjo saved the game by throwing out the balk-advanced runner at the plate -- boy, it's good to have him back. Howe grabbed a smiling Benitez afterwards and gleefully shouted something at him -- something along the lines of, "You'll take it, right?" I'm guessing. Bobby V probably would have made Benitez do laps or something.
I believe this was the Mets' first game of the season against Atlanta. Last year the Braves regularly mopped the floor with the Amazin's, but this game didn't look like a fluke at all. That fat lady hasn't even cleared her throat.
I believe this was the Mets' first game of the season against Atlanta. Last year the Braves regularly mopped the floor with the Amazin's, but this game didn't look like a fluke at all. That fat lady hasn't even cleared her throat.
MAD MAG'S DEVIL'S BARGAIN. Bee-zarre column I just read called "The Reality of Sex Today" (what -- it changed?) from Maggie Gallagher -- I got it in the NY Post but can't find it online, so maybe I'm not the only one who thought it was over the top.
In the piece, Gallagher references sodomy laws (and Andrew Sullivan!) before devolving to what at first seems like her usual Junior Anti-Sex League stuff, but which quickly veers into deep and choppy waters.
Addressing Sullivan's "We are all sodomites now" idea, Gallagher concedes that sodomy may be well and good for some (and makes the point so mildly that a careless reader might miss the novelty of even this mild hint of toleration from one of America's leading judgment queens), but eventually all non-procreative sex must lead to "what men and women really want: a real sexual union, incarnating love, which makes man and woman one flesh." And that ain't cocksucking and cuntlapping in Maggie's book. Non-procreative sex "does not exist," she says, because once guys and gals start fooling around, vaginal intercourse is as inevitable as death and taxes. "How can normal men and women abandon themselves to sexual desire," she writes, "and expect at the same time to rigidly and ruthlessly exercise self-control to avoid what is for men and women the ultimate act of sexual union?"
Notice what she's avoiding here, besides sanity: the subject of gay sex. None of these concerns she mentions apply to same-sexers. At first I thought this was merely the result of inattention caused by a rush of crazy-juice to Gallagher's brain, but now that I think harder about it, I'm beginning to suspect it's part of a devil's bargain that she is consciously working on.
Before she gets to her final aria, Gallagher returns to sodomy laws, and makes what for her is probably a difficult admission: "Does society and law have any business regulating the sexual and intimate relationships between men? I don't know. Probably not."
Notice that it's a tentative offer -- of the sort that someone who is negotiating for something might put, as it were, on the table. Notice that we're also talking about men here, and men only.
Gallagher concludes: "Do we have any stake in shaping the meaning and purpose of sex between the men and women who yearn for one another? This I do know. The Supreme Court be damned. Yes."
"Shaping the meaning and purpose" can, given the context, only mean the abolition of abortion rights (at the very least -- she might want Griswold v. Connecticut overturned as well). Now add to this her mildly tolerant overtures toward gay men -- specifically the conservative Sullivan.
Can you not see the horse-trade that the Legion of Sex-Mad Cultural Conservatives has sent brave Maggie forth to broker?
I can see it -- her zaftig frame packed into liederhosen and a St. Pauli Girl blouse, a Valkyrie helmet pulled down to her eyebrows, Maggie whispers to the Lost Boys:
We'll let you guys have sex all you want -- if you help us overturn Roe v. Wade. Our fight is not with you. We have only come for the children.
You read (or co-fantasized) it here first!
In the piece, Gallagher references sodomy laws (and Andrew Sullivan!) before devolving to what at first seems like her usual Junior Anti-Sex League stuff, but which quickly veers into deep and choppy waters.
Addressing Sullivan's "We are all sodomites now" idea, Gallagher concedes that sodomy may be well and good for some (and makes the point so mildly that a careless reader might miss the novelty of even this mild hint of toleration from one of America's leading judgment queens), but eventually all non-procreative sex must lead to "what men and women really want: a real sexual union, incarnating love, which makes man and woman one flesh." And that ain't cocksucking and cuntlapping in Maggie's book. Non-procreative sex "does not exist," she says, because once guys and gals start fooling around, vaginal intercourse is as inevitable as death and taxes. "How can normal men and women abandon themselves to sexual desire," she writes, "and expect at the same time to rigidly and ruthlessly exercise self-control to avoid what is for men and women the ultimate act of sexual union?"
Notice what she's avoiding here, besides sanity: the subject of gay sex. None of these concerns she mentions apply to same-sexers. At first I thought this was merely the result of inattention caused by a rush of crazy-juice to Gallagher's brain, but now that I think harder about it, I'm beginning to suspect it's part of a devil's bargain that she is consciously working on.
Before she gets to her final aria, Gallagher returns to sodomy laws, and makes what for her is probably a difficult admission: "Does society and law have any business regulating the sexual and intimate relationships between men? I don't know. Probably not."
Notice that it's a tentative offer -- of the sort that someone who is negotiating for something might put, as it were, on the table. Notice that we're also talking about men here, and men only.
Gallagher concludes: "Do we have any stake in shaping the meaning and purpose of sex between the men and women who yearn for one another? This I do know. The Supreme Court be damned. Yes."
"Shaping the meaning and purpose" can, given the context, only mean the abolition of abortion rights (at the very least -- she might want Griswold v. Connecticut overturned as well). Now add to this her mildly tolerant overtures toward gay men -- specifically the conservative Sullivan.
Can you not see the horse-trade that the Legion of Sex-Mad Cultural Conservatives has sent brave Maggie forth to broker?
I can see it -- her zaftig frame packed into liederhosen and a St. Pauli Girl blouse, a Valkyrie helmet pulled down to her eyebrows, Maggie whispers to the Lost Boys:
We'll let you guys have sex all you want -- if you help us overturn Roe v. Wade. Our fight is not with you. We have only come for the children.
You read (or co-fantasized) it here first!
FROM THE CHURCH NEWSLETTER TO DOW JONES. This is what they're publishing at OpinionJournal these days. It's not a matter of disagreeing with the guy, an apparent suburban dad ruminating about all those gol-durned R-rated movies his young'uns want to see (but he won't let 'em, except if it's "The Patriot," because there the R is earned by blood, not sex). There's nothing to disagree with. It's not an argument of any kind, and has no point of any kind; nor is it distinguished by any grace of style or of observation. It's just chatter of the sort you might see in a small-town penny-saver. And the great Dow Jones has published it.
Meanwhile I'm wearing a cardboard belt.
Meanwhile I'm wearing a cardboard belt.
YOU CAN LOOK BUT -- WELL, YOU CAN'T LOOK EITHER. At work I can't read Matthew Yglesias, or CalPundit, or a lot of other inspirational bloggers because my company employs Websense to prevent us peasants from -- well, let me quote the Websense website: "Websense can be used to promote employee productivity. For a quick illustration of how much casual surfing of the Internet could be costing your organization, choose your currency and complete the form on the next page."
Dollars and cents vs. quality of life. The judges are all wearing expensive suits. Guess who wins?
Websense cites a category -- "gambling," "sex," "personal web site," etc. -- when one of its constituents attempts to enter a verboten site. Sometimes it's overzealous -- I can't go to Neal Pollack's site, for example, because Websense thinks it's "tasteless" -- a fair cop in any case, but Websense seems to be thinking about Polish jokes.
For a while I was actually able to get around these computer cops by adding the "www" I'd been omitting from the filtered URLs. But they caught on to that. That's the creepy thing (well, one of them) about these services -- they observe, they learn, and they adapt.
I state here for the record that I am no slacker, and I generally approve everything my company does, in spades & believe you me. But these internet handcuffs send, I believe, an unhelpful message: that any time spending goofing around with general-interest reading is stolen from the company, and locking out certain sites is like locking down the computers themselves -- a rudimentary precaution against the natural depravity of human beings.
I object. Any intellectual labor, like physical labor, requires timely breaks to keep the laboring apparatus fresh. Even Republicans will agree with that, I think. If they don't trust us to choose our own means of refreshment, maybe they should just send Party functionaries around at intervals to lead us in jumping-jacks and songs of praise to our Leader.
Well, this doesn't bear too much fretting over -- and I do have work to do. Look, Boss! I'm refreshed!
Dollars and cents vs. quality of life. The judges are all wearing expensive suits. Guess who wins?
Websense cites a category -- "gambling," "sex," "personal web site," etc. -- when one of its constituents attempts to enter a verboten site. Sometimes it's overzealous -- I can't go to Neal Pollack's site, for example, because Websense thinks it's "tasteless" -- a fair cop in any case, but Websense seems to be thinking about Polish jokes.
For a while I was actually able to get around these computer cops by adding the "www" I'd been omitting from the filtered URLs. But they caught on to that. That's the creepy thing (well, one of them) about these services -- they observe, they learn, and they adapt.
I state here for the record that I am no slacker, and I generally approve everything my company does, in spades & believe you me. But these internet handcuffs send, I believe, an unhelpful message: that any time spending goofing around with general-interest reading is stolen from the company, and locking out certain sites is like locking down the computers themselves -- a rudimentary precaution against the natural depravity of human beings.
I object. Any intellectual labor, like physical labor, requires timely breaks to keep the laboring apparatus fresh. Even Republicans will agree with that, I think. If they don't trust us to choose our own means of refreshment, maybe they should just send Party functionaries around at intervals to lead us in jumping-jacks and songs of praise to our Leader.
Well, this doesn't bear too much fretting over -- and I do have work to do. Look, Boss! I'm refreshed!
BACK IN THE DAY. Friend'o'mine gave me a mix CD. It has the Ramones doing "Street Fighting Man." Shit! So so so cool.
Following is the Donnas, doing "Dirty Denim." Reminds me of something Chuck D once said about the Knicks: "Yeah, you good, but you ain't winning no World Championships."
I miss Joey.
Following is the Donnas, doing "Dirty Denim." Reminds me of something Chuck D once said about the Knicks: "Yeah, you good, but you ain't winning no World Championships."
I miss Joey.
Thursday, May 22, 2003
IT'S RIGHT WHEN WE DO IT, BUT WRONG WHEN YOU DO IT, and there ain't no more to it than that, all internal tergiversations aside.
THE REBA'ATHIFICATION OF SALAM PAX is near complete. He is gone from the Blogger blogroll. Matt Welch and James Lileks speak no more in his defense. And all because, anti-Saddam as he has been, he did not entirely appreciate (in the flag-waving manner of recent TV Iraqis) the takeover of his country. He reports, firsthand, on the devastation of his surroundings. He works for a group calling itself Campaign for Innocent Victims in Conflict -- "Who is paying them? And the organization itself appears shady," says NRO. ("He praises the local Communists, who did nothing to liberate Iraq," the NRO operative adds. No shit. Who got the money for that, Dimmy?)
The postwar does not entirely fit the millenarian scenario proposed by the erstwhile warbloggers. "There is absolutely no distribution method. The aid that is coming in gets taken by whomever and sold on the market. You could buy the whole box for 16.000 dinars (a bit more than 16 US dollars by today’s rate)," reports SP. This can't be encouraging news to the many Americans who have been inclined to wonder when the largesse lavished on the official administrators of the world's newest democracy will run off in the form of Democracy! Whiskey! Sexy! approbation unto its oldest. Some might even question the wisdom of this multimillion-dollar expedition. No surprise, then, that conservatives have put him on their shitlist.
Only those of us cursed with an inclination to follow these internecine struggles will notice, probably. But what about the bigger, more domestic propaganda efforts, like the 2004 Republican Convention, slated to be held near September 11 right here, where the planes hit and most of us despise the President? How many web sites will it take to make that work?
The postwar does not entirely fit the millenarian scenario proposed by the erstwhile warbloggers. "There is absolutely no distribution method. The aid that is coming in gets taken by whomever and sold on the market. You could buy the whole box for 16.000 dinars (a bit more than 16 US dollars by today’s rate)," reports SP. This can't be encouraging news to the many Americans who have been inclined to wonder when the largesse lavished on the official administrators of the world's newest democracy will run off in the form of Democracy! Whiskey! Sexy! approbation unto its oldest. Some might even question the wisdom of this multimillion-dollar expedition. No surprise, then, that conservatives have put him on their shitlist.
Only those of us cursed with an inclination to follow these internecine struggles will notice, probably. But what about the bigger, more domestic propaganda efforts, like the 2004 Republican Convention, slated to be held near September 11 right here, where the planes hit and most of us despise the President? How many web sites will it take to make that work?
A BRIEF REPRIEVE FROM A LITANY OF FAILURES. Alicublog has been receiving props of late, some from longtime favorites and web machers like CalPundit, Tapped, and Ted Barlow, some from guys who are new to me but who obviously know something about pushing words together.
I am flattered, certainly, especially considering the sources. But you can be sure this momentary frisson will not go to my head. Indeed, in this long malaise my life I have many times seen opportunity come and go like a local train suddenly and inconveniently running express, with the conductor thumbing his nose at me as he speeds past. The angels that the Lord sends daily unto me, dressed like the ones in Wings of Desire but less inclined to touch my scalp sympathetically than to beat me with softball bats, will not suddenly change their style of ministration, and neither will my creditors grow less attentive.
And it's only blogging, after all -- not like the sure-fire career path that is rawkn roll!
But I will take my bow and be content.
I am flattered, certainly, especially considering the sources. But you can be sure this momentary frisson will not go to my head. Indeed, in this long malaise my life I have many times seen opportunity come and go like a local train suddenly and inconveniently running express, with the conductor thumbing his nose at me as he speeds past. The angels that the Lord sends daily unto me, dressed like the ones in Wings of Desire but less inclined to touch my scalp sympathetically than to beat me with softball bats, will not suddenly change their style of ministration, and neither will my creditors grow less attentive.
And it's only blogging, after all -- not like the sure-fire career path that is rawkn roll!
But I will take my bow and be content.
Wednesday, May 21, 2003
ANOTHER THING THAT MAKES US GREAT IS OUR AWESOME MODESTY. "Anyway, I think the realism of conservative writing has grown to be more valued in part because realism itself is more valued... You could also say, as many do, that it's not realism so much as ideas that makes for good writing. Since liberalism doesn't have good ideas anymore their writing often seems to be cranky defenses of the status quo or continuation of old discredited policies." -- Jonah Goldberg, NRO's The Corner.
Elsewhere Goldberg and other members of his ass-patting society talk about how stuck up Cornel West is. Apparently West allows words of praise directed toward himself to appear on his website. Why, they must wonder, doesn't he just say them about himself, like real intellectuals do?
Elsewhere Goldberg and other members of his ass-patting society talk about how stuck up Cornel West is. Apparently West allows words of praise directed toward himself to appear on his website. Why, they must wonder, doesn't he just say them about himself, like real intellectuals do?
HOUSING SCHLOCK. I've been seeing a lot of this kind of anti-rent-stabilization article lately. I think their point would be better expressed by colloquy:
PROFESSOR: So you see, Citizen, if we allow your landlord to charge you anything he wants, your rents will actually go down!
CITIZEN: Gosh, Professor! It sure sounds counterintuitive. How d'ya figure?
PROFESSOR: Without this socialist and stultifying rent stabilization, the market will be free to create new housing units, and when these units compete for your rental dollar, that'll drive prices down -- just like it did Cambridge, MA!
CITIZEN: Are you sure about that, Professor? My buddy lives up in Cambridge, and he says the rents are pretty steep --
PROFESSOR: I'm sure your friend is just a disgruntled hippie, Citizen, grown soft from years on the dole.
CITIZEN: Why, so he is, Prof! But that ain't me! I'll sign that bill for you now.
LANDLORD: (reading bill) Mamma mia! So I can-a charge anything I want? The rent, she a-goin' up!
CITIZEN: But, Professor, you said --
PROFESSOR: Well, you can't expect these things to work overnight. Patience, my friend!
(Two years later, they meet again on the street.)
PROFESSOR: Good to see you again, Citizen. Still living on Gunplay Terrace?
CITIZEN: Yeah. (Yawns) Sorry, Professor -- between the scuttling of the rats in my walls and the nightly artillery barrage, I hardly get any sleep. There's good news, though -- next month they're putting in a Starbucks!
PROFESSOR: It appears the genius of the market has placed us each in domiciles appropriate to our social worth.
CITIZEN: You still living in my old apartment?
PROFESSOR: Of course.
LANDLORD: And dey all live-a happily ever after! Ciao!
PROFESSOR: So you see, Citizen, if we allow your landlord to charge you anything he wants, your rents will actually go down!
CITIZEN: Gosh, Professor! It sure sounds counterintuitive. How d'ya figure?
PROFESSOR: Without this socialist and stultifying rent stabilization, the market will be free to create new housing units, and when these units compete for your rental dollar, that'll drive prices down -- just like it did Cambridge, MA!
CITIZEN: Are you sure about that, Professor? My buddy lives up in Cambridge, and he says the rents are pretty steep --
PROFESSOR: I'm sure your friend is just a disgruntled hippie, Citizen, grown soft from years on the dole.
CITIZEN: Why, so he is, Prof! But that ain't me! I'll sign that bill for you now.
LANDLORD: (reading bill) Mamma mia! So I can-a charge anything I want? The rent, she a-goin' up!
CITIZEN: But, Professor, you said --
PROFESSOR: Well, you can't expect these things to work overnight. Patience, my friend!
(Two years later, they meet again on the street.)
PROFESSOR: Good to see you again, Citizen. Still living on Gunplay Terrace?
CITIZEN: Yeah. (Yawns) Sorry, Professor -- between the scuttling of the rats in my walls and the nightly artillery barrage, I hardly get any sleep. There's good news, though -- next month they're putting in a Starbucks!
PROFESSOR: It appears the genius of the market has placed us each in domiciles appropriate to our social worth.
CITIZEN: You still living in my old apartment?
PROFESSOR: Of course.
LANDLORD: And dey all live-a happily ever after! Ciao!
RENT-A-RESISTER. Andrea Peyser writes in today's NY Post of "two lefty activists, teachers with advanced degrees in civil disobedience" instructing "stroller-pushing moms and doting dads... proudly American, politically conservative" in Cobble Hill how to conduct themselves during a planned sit-in at a local firehouse. (Engine Co. 204 is one of those slated by our depraved Mayor Richie Rich to close.)
Peyser's tone throughout is sympathetic, and she even tugs at our sleeves, if not our heartstrings (from my experience of her writing, I don't think she knows where those are, either on us or on her), suggesting that these "proudly American" worthies were heroically placing themselves in harm's way for the good of their children. "Folks here in the most populous outer borough feel as if Bloomberg has taken out a contract on their lives," she writes. "The budding domestic protesters were told to arrange for someone to pick up their children to prevent them from being placed in foster care. These dedicated moms deserve better, Mr. Mayor."
Compare and contrast, class! Here's the selfsame Peyser covering an anti-war demo back in March:
"Don't they know that it's the people who will suffer?" I wonder if Mayor Rich will roll this out as a talking point, should the firehouse protest materialize. I wonder also if any of the "vintage radicals" from the earlier story were among the "teachers with advanced degrees in civil disobedience" instructing the Cobble Hill group. And I wonder if Peyser would have been nicer about the anti-war protestors if they were dressed more "proudly America" (e.g., in relaxed-fit jeans, shapeless sweatshirts, expensive name-brand athletic shoes, etc).
I do not, though, wonder how Andrea Peyser got a job at the Post. Despite their gleeful, near-daily pounding of the Times, standards at Rupert's Rag are a limbo stick, and it's really just a matter of how low you can go.
Peyser's tone throughout is sympathetic, and she even tugs at our sleeves, if not our heartstrings (from my experience of her writing, I don't think she knows where those are, either on us or on her), suggesting that these "proudly American" worthies were heroically placing themselves in harm's way for the good of their children. "Folks here in the most populous outer borough feel as if Bloomberg has taken out a contract on their lives," she writes. "The budding domestic protesters were told to arrange for someone to pick up their children to prevent them from being placed in foster care. These dedicated moms deserve better, Mr. Mayor."
Compare and contrast, class! Here's the selfsame Peyser covering an anti-war demo back in March:
Despite the valiant efforts of a few high school hooky players, college class-cutters, trust-funded artists and vintage radicals -- all graced with enough tongue- and nose-piercings to decorate a season of "Survivor" -- yesterday's so-called "die-in" was dead on arrival... the hundreds of cops who were diverted from real emergencies handled the idiot protesters with grace... Not that they liked it. "They took us away from the neighborhoods for this," complained one plainclothes officer. "Don't they know that it's the people who will suffer?"
"Don't they know that it's the people who will suffer?" I wonder if Mayor Rich will roll this out as a talking point, should the firehouse protest materialize. I wonder also if any of the "vintage radicals" from the earlier story were among the "teachers with advanced degrees in civil disobedience" instructing the Cobble Hill group. And I wonder if Peyser would have been nicer about the anti-war protestors if they were dressed more "proudly America" (e.g., in relaxed-fit jeans, shapeless sweatshirts, expensive name-brand athletic shoes, etc).
I do not, though, wonder how Andrea Peyser got a job at the Post. Despite their gleeful, near-daily pounding of the Times, standards at Rupert's Rag are a limbo stick, and it's really just a matter of how low you can go.
HOWARD BEACH. HOWARD BEACH. I was required to attend an employee testimonial out in Howard Beach. All I knew about the neighborhood prior to this evening was that a group of young white guys had chased a black kid onto the Belt Parkway there in 1986. The kid, Michael Griffith, was struck by traffic and killed. Things were ugly in New York for a while after. I remember heading home late one night around that time on the Lower East Side, and noticing some young black guys coming out of a club. As I walked on, I heard someone behind me say, "Let's get the cracker. Howard Beach. Howard Beach." Nothing happened to me, though there were a couple of incidents in that period that probably began the same way.
As Lou Reed said, those were different times.
Tonight's event was at a big old hall called Russo's By The Bay. It's one of those parkway palaces -- a large, filigreed block of stone with thin red carpet and jacketed valets out front, and ornate rooms inside -- good place for your stereotypical Queens wedding reception. As we drove to the place (the company generously spotted me to a car service), I scoped the streets of the neighborhood. Its boundary was announced by gold lettering on a wooden sign painted sky blue, like you'd expect to see at a yacht club. Strolling the streets were young Italian men, and young black men, and young Hispanic men, all in casual clothes and looking comfortable and happy. When I stepped out of the car onto the red carpet, I could smell the sea.
I was seated at a circular table (#9), surrounded mostly by women who sold goods for the company. They were nearly all black, all very well-behaved, happy to be there but not overly demonstrative. I endeavored to draw them out. I drank the wine that flowed. We chatted, had some laughs. I sat next to a very ample middle-aged woman who'd had trouble with her leg, she explained, and this had caused her weight to increase, though she did a lot of walking in her business. She was cheerful and friendly and I was glad to sit with her and hear her deep laughter, though I occasionally turned my attention to an older white woman, very compact in stature and gesture, who announced forthrightly that she had been in the Holocaust, and her son, a chubby fellow wearing a filthy striped shirt and a straw cowboy hat, who seemed primarily interested in the food.
I stepped out to the red carpet every so often to have a smoke. Other guests of the event came out there, all black women. We conversed mildly, except when they were occupied with the company of their friends. One woman sheathed in several layers of diaphonous black fabric laughed uproariously, standing barefoot and sometimes stamping with glee on the thin carpet. One woman with many, many jewel-like encrustations on her black eyeglass frames complained to me, in a good-humored way, that she had been at the job 19 years and had hardly won any of the prizes given out at these events. I wished her luck. Across the street was an Italian restaurant with its roof peaked and striped to look like a circus tent, and a circular passage inside the doorway inscribed with the words FOOD, FAMILY, and FUN.
The event was MC'd by a local bigwig with a Spanish name who looked and acted like a cross between Kevin Spacey and Tim Allen. He energetically announced a series of awards and gifts from the shallow stage, each punctuated by audio stings from a DJ at the other side of the room. The guests were only mildly attentive. They had to work the next day. So did I, but I clapped and attended very attentively, being in the communications business. I noticed that the woman with the jewel-like encrustations had been called up to receive a small box of something or other. I waved and hollered to her; she waved back with a small smile.
I got in the car somewhere between 10:30 and 11 to ride back to my apartment. The car radio played old hits, some of them from the Michael Griffith era. I watched the city roll by, its lights large and bright and imperturbable.
As Lou Reed said, those were different times.
Tonight's event was at a big old hall called Russo's By The Bay. It's one of those parkway palaces -- a large, filigreed block of stone with thin red carpet and jacketed valets out front, and ornate rooms inside -- good place for your stereotypical Queens wedding reception. As we drove to the place (the company generously spotted me to a car service), I scoped the streets of the neighborhood. Its boundary was announced by gold lettering on a wooden sign painted sky blue, like you'd expect to see at a yacht club. Strolling the streets were young Italian men, and young black men, and young Hispanic men, all in casual clothes and looking comfortable and happy. When I stepped out of the car onto the red carpet, I could smell the sea.
I was seated at a circular table (#9), surrounded mostly by women who sold goods for the company. They were nearly all black, all very well-behaved, happy to be there but not overly demonstrative. I endeavored to draw them out. I drank the wine that flowed. We chatted, had some laughs. I sat next to a very ample middle-aged woman who'd had trouble with her leg, she explained, and this had caused her weight to increase, though she did a lot of walking in her business. She was cheerful and friendly and I was glad to sit with her and hear her deep laughter, though I occasionally turned my attention to an older white woman, very compact in stature and gesture, who announced forthrightly that she had been in the Holocaust, and her son, a chubby fellow wearing a filthy striped shirt and a straw cowboy hat, who seemed primarily interested in the food.
I stepped out to the red carpet every so often to have a smoke. Other guests of the event came out there, all black women. We conversed mildly, except when they were occupied with the company of their friends. One woman sheathed in several layers of diaphonous black fabric laughed uproariously, standing barefoot and sometimes stamping with glee on the thin carpet. One woman with many, many jewel-like encrustations on her black eyeglass frames complained to me, in a good-humored way, that she had been at the job 19 years and had hardly won any of the prizes given out at these events. I wished her luck. Across the street was an Italian restaurant with its roof peaked and striped to look like a circus tent, and a circular passage inside the doorway inscribed with the words FOOD, FAMILY, and FUN.
The event was MC'd by a local bigwig with a Spanish name who looked and acted like a cross between Kevin Spacey and Tim Allen. He energetically announced a series of awards and gifts from the shallow stage, each punctuated by audio stings from a DJ at the other side of the room. The guests were only mildly attentive. They had to work the next day. So did I, but I clapped and attended very attentively, being in the communications business. I noticed that the woman with the jewel-like encrustations had been called up to receive a small box of something or other. I waved and hollered to her; she waved back with a small smile.
I got in the car somewhere between 10:30 and 11 to ride back to my apartment. The car radio played old hits, some of them from the Michael Griffith era. I watched the city roll by, its lights large and bright and imperturbable.
Tuesday, May 20, 2003
A PLEA FOR SLACK. I studied this Salon article by Steven E. Landsburg several minutes, hoping there was some Modest-Proposal satirical angle I was missing. But there was not: he really thinks we should "punish" juries that hand down verdicts that turn out to be "wrong" (more on the second set of quote marks in a bit).
The goal, says Landsburg, is to give jurors "incentive to get their verdicts right in the first place." Good verdicts win you a check; bad ones get you a fine (!).
This is wrong is so many ways it makes the head spin, but I will focus only on two:
First, the idea of a "wrong" verdict. Landsburg uses the Lemrick Nelson case to add punch to his argument -- he got away with murder! -- and another involving a wrongly-convicted, DNA-liberated guy, just to show that he's not just bloodthirsty, I guess. The injustices in both these cases would seem clear to any reader. But has Landsburg never heard of jury nullification? Supposing the jury decided to decide "wrongly" -- that is, contrary to the instructions of the court and even of the law -- in the interests of what they perceive to be justice. Fine 'em, I expect Landsberg would say, maybe twice for being bad sports.
But it's not that simple. Say a bank, acting as plaintiff, wants to attach the pay of a guy whose wife is fighting cancer. The law might be on the bank's side, but the jury might say, fuck this, we're cutting the guy a break. If you're Landsburg, this is an easy call, but If you believe, as I do, the jury retains the right to pronounce however it sees fit for whatever reason, then the idea of reward/punishment for juries is an onerous, indeed unconstitutional, imposition on their franchise -- and, in cases like this one, on justice itself.
The second point is bigger. Landsberg's threatened-jury-is-a-motivated jury concept is very close to a depressing trend of our times -- that is, bullying as an acceptable means of "improving behavior." Quite apart from our government's unconscionable behavior at the international level, there is a tendency for the powerful to leverage their advantage over the less powerful, and Landsberg even acknowledges this in his reasoning: "The way to make workers diligent, as every manager knows, is to reward them when they succeed and punish them when they fail... Every assembly line worker in America, every cab driver, every doctor and lawyer and magazine columnist, reaps financial rewards and punishments that depend on his performance." I like the conflation of line workers and doctors -- but we all know which category of worker is more likely to get canned for being a little slow on a given morning.
God dammit, why do we all have to be so efficient anyway? Our society is lousy with efficiency experts, ergonometricians, etc., but it seems to me a much less happy place than it was before these pests came onto the scene.
That may be my wider reason for disliking this idea so much. I don't think we should be looking to regulate more aspects of our lives. I think we should be doing the opposite.
The goal, says Landsburg, is to give jurors "incentive to get their verdicts right in the first place." Good verdicts win you a check; bad ones get you a fine (!).
This is wrong is so many ways it makes the head spin, but I will focus only on two:
First, the idea of a "wrong" verdict. Landsburg uses the Lemrick Nelson case to add punch to his argument -- he got away with murder! -- and another involving a wrongly-convicted, DNA-liberated guy, just to show that he's not just bloodthirsty, I guess. The injustices in both these cases would seem clear to any reader. But has Landsburg never heard of jury nullification? Supposing the jury decided to decide "wrongly" -- that is, contrary to the instructions of the court and even of the law -- in the interests of what they perceive to be justice. Fine 'em, I expect Landsberg would say, maybe twice for being bad sports.
But it's not that simple. Say a bank, acting as plaintiff, wants to attach the pay of a guy whose wife is fighting cancer. The law might be on the bank's side, but the jury might say, fuck this, we're cutting the guy a break. If you're Landsburg, this is an easy call, but If you believe, as I do, the jury retains the right to pronounce however it sees fit for whatever reason, then the idea of reward/punishment for juries is an onerous, indeed unconstitutional, imposition on their franchise -- and, in cases like this one, on justice itself.
The second point is bigger. Landsberg's threatened-jury-is-a-motivated jury concept is very close to a depressing trend of our times -- that is, bullying as an acceptable means of "improving behavior." Quite apart from our government's unconscionable behavior at the international level, there is a tendency for the powerful to leverage their advantage over the less powerful, and Landsberg even acknowledges this in his reasoning: "The way to make workers diligent, as every manager knows, is to reward them when they succeed and punish them when they fail... Every assembly line worker in America, every cab driver, every doctor and lawyer and magazine columnist, reaps financial rewards and punishments that depend on his performance." I like the conflation of line workers and doctors -- but we all know which category of worker is more likely to get canned for being a little slow on a given morning.
God dammit, why do we all have to be so efficient anyway? Our society is lousy with efficiency experts, ergonometricians, etc., but it seems to me a much less happy place than it was before these pests came onto the scene.
That may be my wider reason for disliking this idea so much. I don't think we should be looking to regulate more aspects of our lives. I think we should be doing the opposite.
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