parrhesia

poem

2011-12-01T08:58:00.000-06:00

My mind is like the needle

at the end of a record,

endlessly cuh-shuh cuh-shuhing

in the final groove.

Metaphysics and Morality In 10 minutes or less

2011-08-05T08:33:00.000-05:00

Reductionism

2011-07-29T08:33:00.000-05:00

Why do I do it?

2011-07-24T15:00:00.002-05:00

What is philosophy? And why do I care?

Free Will Part Deux

2011-07-16T16:46:00.007-05:00

The beginnings of a discussion of compatibilism v. incompatibilism.

Free Will in 10 minutes or less

2011-07-15T13:42:00.003-05:00

Podcast 2. Here it is!

Baby's First Podcast

2011-07-11T16:26:00.002-05:00

I'm podcasting. I think. Try this link and let me know.

poem

2011-07-01T12:58:00.001-05:00

words like leaves

Words, like leaves,
fall past my fingers
and linger
for a moment, then wither
in the sunlight –
bright brittle reminders
of poems I might have written.

2011-03-08T11:09:00.001-06:00

Poem

2010-05-17T07:55:00.001-05:00

The Soul Has Gone

Without will
everything is physical now;
the matter of the world
is all that I can feel.

Forward movement of limbs,
wind pushing from this side
now that; the rustling leaves
keep me alive.

Bodies colliding
give off energy. The heat
and light of the world
all that matters now.

Sleepless gnashing of teeth,
breath coming soft, now
hard and fast, dreams of
falling; gravity forcing me down.

Walking in the sunlight
is the last of my life, hard
concrete sidewalks, shouts
of children hidden from view.

No presence or absence
of beauty, just sound, sight,
smell, taste, touch without
judgment; I am a mere body.

Poem

2010-02-03T07:28:00.001-06:00

Slender Allotment

In the hallways of downtowns,

behind the drowning

drone of computers whirring,

beneath the chafing stiffness

of crisp clean shirts,

below the surface

of the freshly showered skin,

beat the hearts

of men and women,

blood running thin,

the rhythm of time

slowly drifting by;

amid reams of paper and reports,

coffee-stained and rearranged

daily output and input streams

of information regarding

wickets and widgets

or dreams coldly reduced

to predictions of profit and loss-

this is where our lives occur,

this is where we pass the time,

our shallow slender

allotment of eternity.

Poem

2009-10-11T11:41:00.000-05:00

Journal Entry

by Frank Hill

can’t write.
nothing to say, I guess.

nostalgia
for so-called shallow joys –
first loves
rock n’ roll n’
bong hits.

the innocence I’ve known, as they say.

that first innocence
a mere longing long ago
for so-called simpler times-
family and home.

But
my father is a man,
my mother a woman.
not now nor never been
hero or villain.

lou reed said,
villains always blink their eyes… hoo!

the rest of us must tear up a lot.

Poem

2009-09-17T10:02:00.003-05:00

Present
by Frank Hill

As this moment

emerges

into the future

and recedes

into the past,

what will you have become?

what will you have lost?

Poem

2009-08-21T13:41:00.003-05:00

The Geometrics of Meaning
by Isa Harper

Blades gleam
in soapy water;
I imagine
the body carvings of depressives
as Dylan sings
of Ophelia’s sin.

“Lifeless”
being merely
the difference
between
here… and… there,
where there
is an unknown,
possibly zero,
quantity
and here,
though written in the syntax of suffering,
is known to contain
at least one measurable unit –
the angle of sunlight
on a kitchen floor
where the domesticity
of one man
plays out
like a ritual.

poem

2009-08-19T15:27:00.004-05:00

Nature’s God;
or, the misapprehension of Self’s relation to the whole;
or, abolishing the forms to which I am accustomed
by Frank Hill

Blank page…
Blinking cursor…
What next?

“When in the course
of human events
it becomes necessary…,”etc.;
my own little
declaration,
whose first draft
will not haunt
halls Historical,
but… drift
instead
unread
by many
in a digital
dem o cratic
sea.

Statement:
speech in a void
is as good as none.

Self-evident?
True?
Or False?
One?
Or Zero?

Today I declare myself:
alone,
adrift,
anchorless…
Independent?

Poem

2009-06-11T12:03:00.003-05:00

Pinball
by Isa Harper

Back & forth
digital 2 analog
seeking the social
n’ finding only
chatrooms full of strangers’
emoticons – self-reflective
digital detritus
on the sea of experience;
not social, only solo
with witnesses.

Even writing now,
an exercise in solo;
when will I be together again?

Bouncing around
this space & sound
of body & time
not mine, but borrowed, I
play my GHEE-tar
and wonder where you are-
my playmates,
my friends,
my lovers,
all gone now – even
those that aren’t. I
log on
to the
digital
an’ I log off
of the
digital
an' I log on
to the
analog, on
to the real world -
not the Facebook reality
where you and me
merge unawares
of other and self;
either we don’t care
or don’t understand
that we should,
but,
as they say:

“I will try
to understand,
either way.”

“& i do
and eye doo
hand eye do
doo doo doo doo doo doo”

The recording remains,
analog 2 digital -

“back & forth &
back & forth &
back & forth
around again”

like a pinball in a game
of Life – surreal &
unlikely and without
an eye to the useful.

An’ I log off to
analog.

ttfn

lqtm

lmao

cqtm

ta ta for now
laugh quietly to myself
laugh my ass off
cry…
quietly…
2
my self.

:)…

poem

2009-06-07T10:54:00.003-05:00

Self-showing
or
Things in themselves
by Frank Hill

Standing,
I pull myself from the floor of Plato’s cave,
insistent on seeking the source of this lie,
the light of which refracts,
projecting dancing shadows
on the walls of my underworld dwelling.

I fall, sick, at the threshold. And now,
with the unwanted help of strangers,
I am dragged kicking and screaming to the lie,
this light that shines and blinds
as the rocks scrape
my knees,
my palms,
the tops of my feet.

Resigned and bodily dropped, I crawl,
too dizzy to look but to the scratched floor
where so many have been dragged before;
slowly, slowly, my eyes adjust to new light,
the lie of which is shown to be
only the self-showing of me
to the world under which I have dwelt and knelt
with my cave-dwelling tribe.

No light,
no lie
brought me to the surface;
force applied and again
applied again
until resistance was only
stone scraping skin
as I dragged myself to the lie above
in hopes of returning with magnificent tales.

I will tell the tale with fear, and hope
that those who’ve stayed behind, or
been dragged a different path, may love me still
and embrace the self-showing
of the sun that I’ve become.

Poem

2009-06-02T15:06:00.004-05:00

The Platonic Tradition
by Frank Hill

Pale,
cold,
gray
concept nets
is how Nietzsche
put it;
rationality, a death-trap
for the fishes of sense -
I imagine
the frozen,
calloused hands of
New England fishermen
working at the icy ropes
of Platonic forms,
pulled from leaden
waters,
hands grabbing
the flopping fishes
of sense and slicing
flesh for bait.

self portrait 4

2009-06-01T11:19:00.002-05:00

Dream

2009-05-31T07:28:00.000-05:00

Some statements are not holographs.

Dream

2009-05-31T07:27:00.001-05:00

The onion, who is other than it, says, "I am the onion," and finds himself lost.

Poem

2009-05-31T07:24:00.003-05:00

Like, the moment after the fall

Eve shucks the shallow side
and covers up her depths
while Adam learns,
with a monkey's grace,
his very first dance steps.

Isa Harper: a brief introduction

2009-05-31T06:50:00.004-05:00

The attentive and/or long-time reader of Parrhesia will notice the name Isa Harper here and there, as author, character, scapegoat. Harper is a figment of my imagination, his name an anagram for Parrhesia.

The blog is a very strange discursive space; at once personal and absolutely de-personalized, it allows for an entirely new set of statements and figurings - artistic, political, satirical, etc. However, the line between narrator and author are non-existent in the grammar of the traditional blog. Unless something is attributed to someone else explicitly, the audience assumes the confessional nature of the blog is to be taken at face value. To overcome this entirely would take the deceptive act of adopting a blog persona and writing from that mental space. However, the self-deception that would need to take place to do so is herculean in scope and defeats the very premise of my blog, Parrhesia (translated as "fearless speech" via Foucault). One cannot speak fearlessly and speak pseudonymonously. The two are incompatible.

So, instead, I opt for this third option. Of course, not everyone will read this post who reads a poem by Isa Harper on my page, but if there is ever a question I can point them to this post as an apologia and an explanation of sorts. It is necessary, lest I be confused with my narrator (for all those who know me and read me) and so that I can write whatever it is that I am wont to write in this space, in my voice or in the voice of another.

In a novel, it is much easier perhaps. Twain writes, "You don't know about me without you have read a book by the name of The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; but that ain't no matter." Melville writes, "Call me Ishmael." Immediately we know we are dealing with a narrator. (Please note: no comparison between my writing and these greats is meant. These are just famous examples that came to mind straightaway and did not require a lot of effort to find - I'm a lazy author at heart, one of the reasons I make no comparison to these greats.)

Where was I? Oh yes, immediately we know we're dealing with a narrator. However, I write, "Life's a bitch and then you marry one" and it's a little bit less clear that between myself and my marriage and those words there is a third party - a narrator who is speaking colloquially of his own marriage, not mine. So, I attribute it to someone else and make clear that I am doing so and that that someone else is my character to do with as I please. (Sounds dirty.)

And unlike authors, narrators can be made unreliable, can twist and turn in ways that a fearlessly speaking author cannot. When I write outside Harper's voice, I am writing for myself and attempting to be held accountable for the words in some parrhesiastic sense, whether I am speaking artistically, politically, ethically, etc. When I write in Harper's voice, I am still attempting to write fearlessly but with a clear remove from myself and those that I love so that no one is confused as to what's what and who is who.

One final note. This is a new update to my blog and so I will gradually be making sure that archives reflect the name of Isa Harper as their "author." But this will take time. If you see something and you think, that doesn't sound like the Frank Hill I know... write a comment (I love getting them!) and tell me. You might find out that I simply misattributed the thing. Or you might learn something new about the Frank Hill you know. :)

The biolographical details of Harper's existence will emerge over time. They are, to say the least, sketchy at this time.

But then again, what would we expect from him - he's a sketchy guy. ;)

Go Empathy!!! Hip Hip Hooray!!

2009-05-26T08:46:00.006-05:00

There has been some concern expressed that Obama has chosen Sotomayor for her demonstrated "empathy." Need we remind the learned representatives that empathy is one of the fundamentals of representative democracy, without which one cannot ever presume to "speak" for another?

Aaaargh!!!

breathing

2009-05-21T20:10:00.006-05:00

One need not theorize breath;
one need only breathe
in and out
without self,
without other,
without reflection.

Breathing on a mirror fogs the image;
breathe away from mirrors
and avert your gaze from that
of the breather
for he needs you not
to reflect.

updated lyrics to "This Train is Bound For Glory"

2009-05-20T08:37:00.001-05:00

Instead of gamblers and hustlers, I've changed it around a little bit.

Open to suggestions:

This train don’t carry no racists
this train
This train don’t carry no racists
this train
This train don’t carry no racists
no noose hangers, no two-bit stasists,
This train don’t carry no racists
this train.

This train don’t carry no homophobes
this train
This train don’t carry no homophobes
this train
This train don’t carry no homophobes,
no truck draggers, no right wing queens,
this train don’t carry no double talk,
this train.

Shepherd and the Lone Wolf Music Video

2009-05-19T07:31:00.000-05:00

another meditative morning

2009-05-19T05:28:00.002-05:00

birds off the deck

2009-05-18T12:47:00.002-05:00

taken this morning off the deck. I just love all the sounds.

Again... hysterical and no more need be said

2009-05-18T08:09:00.001-05:00

Fucking Hysterical

2009-05-18T08:01:00.000-05:00

Birago Diop

2009-05-18T07:04:00.001-05:00

When Birago Diop said, "Listen more often to things than to beings," he probably was not thinking of a nature sounds white noise machine from Brookstone.

Reclining Guitar

2009-05-17T14:38:00.002-05:00

Self portrait 3

2009-05-17T14:36:00.004-05:00

Red Wheelbarrow Revisited

2009-05-17T08:05:00.001-05:00

so much depends
upon

the waking
soundings

of William
Carlos

Williams’ poem;
he who

like all pediatric
poets,

examined
my children:

these lines
written

on a Sunday
morning

in Chicago
while

squirrels click
and robins

call outside
my window.

Coffee and
cigarettes

and cell phone
in hand,

I stand on
my deck

anew, wondering
at the nature
of simultaneity
and if it’s changed…

more poems from college

2009-05-16T17:19:00.003-05:00

Concrete Poem

2009-05-16T09:44:00.003-05:00

Anglo-Saxon Prosody

2009-05-16T09:35:00.005-05:00

Poetic License

2009-05-16T09:00:00.006-05:00

Our professor in college, Lew Turco, gave these out upon successful completion of his class. I'll have to hang it up in my office sometime.

Portrait of the Poet as a young man

2009-05-16T08:49:00.002-05:00

A poem from college that I just found:

ashtray breath
brown briefcase
no hello
how are you?
good morning
can't afford it
time is money
barking
type
copy
file these
no please
baggy pants
polo shirt
itchy ass
scratch it
coach
team needs you
business meetings
trips
dinners
wine
steak
eat
smoke
drink
team needs you
itchy ass
scratch it
heart attack at fifty two
barking
type
copy
file these
no please
no thank you

self portrait 2

2009-05-15T19:53:00.001-05:00

Bad Joke Telling Skills

2009-05-15T06:52:00.011-05:00

I performed "The Banks of the Ohio" (link is to my album on Last.FM and is a recording of a rehearsal) with my old time ensemble at our Old Town School of Folk Music graduation. Me on vocals and guitar. My friends Alex, Aron, and Claire on mandolin, banjo/vocals, and fiddle/whistle, respectively. The link is a recording of one of our rehearsals. Feel free to take a listen. Hopefully it doesn't make you register for anything to do so. My first post to last.fm.

The lyrics, which may be hard to make out from the recording, are as follows:

I asked my love to take a walk
Just a little ways with me
And as we walked and we would talk
All about our weddingday

CHORUS:
Darling say that you'll be mine
In our home we'll happy be
Down beside where the waters flow
On the banks of the Ohio

I took her by her pretty white hand
I let her down that bank of sand
I pushed her in where she would drown
Lord, I saw her as she floated down

Returning home about twelve or one
Thinking "Lord, what a deed I've done?"
I killed the girl I love, you see
Because she would not marry me

_____

Now, one of the rules of the graduation was that you had to prepare jokes to tell while the banjo tuned, cause they have to tune for different keys (I just learned this). I, of course, vetted all my jokes with my fellow bandmates, but I don't think they're a good judge of audience anymore. No offense, guys.

My first joke was this:
Q: What's the difference between a professional musician and a 15" pizza?
A: The pizza can feed a family.

Mild. Funny. Mildly funny. EVERYONE LAUGHED. Guffaw!!

The second joke was more in the vein of the song (sweet ballad that turns into pscyho fantasy) but I literally got booed. If the audience had had fruit, they would have thrown it. Here goes...

Q: How many male chauvinists does it take to screw in a light bulb?

....
....
........
....

A: None. The bitch can cook in the dark!

BOOOOOOOOO

I got one laugh from my friend Kristin. And then the fiddle player (woman) defended me saying, "but you all laughed when he killed the love of his life in the last song...?"

Lesson: context clues are important.

Other hit joke of the night besides my first one:

Q: What did one muffin say to the other?
A: Oh my gawd, a talking muffin!

blah....

the other one that received only groans:

Q: Why did Raggedy Ann keep getting kicked out of the toybox?

A: She kept sitting on Pinocchio's face and screaming, "Lie to me! Lie to me!"

Now THAT's funny!!

:)

Self Portrait Video :)

2009-05-14T15:20:00.001-05:00

Joke

2009-05-13T08:24:00.002-05:00

Q: What do you call Cheney wearing an Obama Biden nosering?
A: A good start. :)

Where Did You Sleep Last Night?

2009-05-12T09:12:00.000-05:00

Worried Man Blues

2009-05-11T19:50:00.000-05:00

Poem

2009-05-02T11:39:00.007-05:00

5-7-7:
when sexual selection goes right
or
How Steve Martin's Early Work saved my marriage

by Isa Harper

Life's a bitch, and then
you marry one, and then you
realize, "I'm a Jerk!"

Thank God for Family

2009-04-25T16:20:00.001-05:00

A poem by one of our sisters given to me by one of my mothers.

Enjoy it. :)

The Journey
by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting
their bad advice---
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.
“Mend my life!”
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.
You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations,
though their melancholy
was terrible.
It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.

But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do---
determined to save
the only life you could save.

Poem

2009-04-25T07:51:00.010-05:00

Expectations
by Isa Harper

Through the glass door
of her office,
I saw her black face
marked by the sin
of American inauguration,
a revolution fought and old
so she could be bought
and sold for less than the least of these my brothers.

She seemed
to me to be
gesturing
and mumbling
to herself, chanting
some ancient ritual
from the
trees of a jungle
unknown to me as I
bungled for the door knob, then winced
and,
forgetting myself,
knocked before entering
like the cops never do
if they really do
want to get you.

Her right arm
was extended
above her
in some kinda
defensive posture
for a moment;
I saw
a knife in her hands! The creased black crows
of her eyes
popped
into relief like some
wide-eyed minstrel demon
and I felt
a drop of sweat
on my brow -
she was a killer after all! Just like
just like
just like all
the rest of
them;
TV
was right
about them all. They
all do this. They're
killers.
Left to their own
devices, they'd rape
us all and eat our daughters,
wiping fresh blood
from their grey lips
those white teeth popping
and snapping
like a tiger!

And then it happened.

That thing.

that thing. what was it?

what is that?

is that... a ... knife?

what's...

She smiled.

:)

and I thought . . .
...
...

and then I smiled

:)

She dropped her hand slightly and waved me in.

Good morning, she said. I'm afraid you caught me practicing my fly cast
without a pole...
... a little ...

embarrassing.

Mr. Harper, is it?

Yes, ma'am, I uttered, breathlessly... barely...

blushing... naked white skin blushing...

Have a seat, she said.

The trophy fish
stuffed along the wall. There
the photo of her with friends
along a stream in
was that Montana?

And I thought, but did not say,
because humor is fickle,
like sickle cell,
"If only I could see it, she's probably
blushing too."

And I smiled, and said,
What is that, a brook trout?

Poem

2009-04-25T01:19:00.024-05:00

Extraordinary Rendition
or,
Give Hope a Chance:
Y uh hunert daze doan proof shit, bitches!
or,
Stop focusing on the past; today's the only day left
or,
this is not a rehearsal! this is the real fuckin' thing!

(Ladies and Gentleman:

the former President of the United States of America,

Theo L.D. Whiteman!)

.......

***

***

***

......

Uh... thank you....

thank you very much...

thank you....

you're very kind, really.

too kind

too kind

Thank you..

Thank you..

No, please, please sit. I....

Thank you....

please.

please.

Thank you.. Thank you so much

I'm being paid by the hour, so ....

thank you...

thank you....

you can just keep doing that all night.

Thank you...

wave to the camera.

Thank you...
okay...

Well, I thought I'd start

thank you

with a

no, please, please. you're too kind.

Thank you...

I thought I'd start with a joke.

What's 2+2?

No.

Just kidding..

heh heh

just kidding, that wasn't the joke.

Here it is:

What did one paper bag say to the other?

...

...

..........

.......................

........

.................

..
.......
.............................................................

......

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......

..................
....
............................

.............

.....
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.....

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..........................................

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.
.
.........

:)...........

..........

.......................:

::::))>

.....................

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................

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,,,, ....... ,,,,,,, /////

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.

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:)

(that's much too long a pause.)

Oh.

Uh... okay...

uh...

Sorry... I'll uh...

try again.

ahem....

What did one paper bag... OW!

That was my ear, dude!

Seriously, what the fuck?!

ow.
....
...

Jesus!

Yeah, I'm talkin' to you, boy!

No not you, Faggot!

The other one!

No, not you neither, sycophant!

You, the one with the brown skin and the wooly hair like a sweet little lamb

mmmmmm.....

laaaaamb.....

...

Anyway...

Yeah, you!

Don't just look at me.

Your name is Jesus, right?

(mmumblemumblemumble)

Speak up, boy! You sound like you got marbles in your mouth!

You a fuckin' marble mouth? I didn't think so!

What's your name, Marble Mouth!

(It's Jesus, sir.)

...
...
...
...!...
:
:
:... :...

Oh! Haaaay-Seuss! My bad, dude! Sorry.
...

...

...

Anyway, hey-Sue's...

if that IS your real name...

heh heh uh heh

uh... heh.

Anyway, uh Xchay-soos...

was that right?

(close.)

okay. uh, sorry.

(no problem. what did you want?)

what?

.....

......

......

Oh, right.

Could you

sorry, got distracted for a minute.

sorry about that, Jesus.

I mean, HaysOOs!

Where was I?

Oh, yeah. Could you uh
please
turn down
my
head set, Jesus?

(no problem)

Amen!

(sure thing)

Thank you!

Sweet Jesus! Thank you! I mean, haysoos.

Thank you, Lordy! Whew!

Them earphones was hurtin' me somethin' awful.

So, thank you!

I... uh... I mean, adios. Is that..

Is that right?

COE MOE SAY dee SAY "thank you."?

(no problem, man. let's just do this, okay?)

Sure, sure thing, man. Sure... uh, thanks.

uh, what are we doing?

(From the top.)

You want me to go again?

Okay. From the top? Alright. No problem

From the top.

(From the top.)

So... uh... what did uh

what did

one paper bag

say to the other?

...
.......

What?

(too short. way too short that time.)

Okay... okay... keep your shorts on, Jesus.

I mean... sorry! Sorry. Wouldn't want you to turn those
ear phones up again
and melt my brain
or nothin'

heh uh

heh heh

okay.... well, ... awright then....

..... :

:

I'll try again, I guess.

.....

ahem!

enh enh enh! enh ahem! Sorry. Excuse me.

....
.......
...
uh...
....

what uh... what....

sorry. excuse me.

I think I have a little gas, actually.

Yeah... oh, yeah

......

.......

.... there it goes.

That's better, actually.

...
whew!

Sorry about that one, Jesus.

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little stinky.
yeah.
sorry about that...

uh... anyway... uh...

from the top:

What did one paper bag say to the other?

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What?

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I'm so dumb I can't even think my way outta you.

...

:)

Something to think about... or not, as the case may be :)

2009-04-20T06:29:00.003-05:00

mindfulness

This post takes about 1 hour probably to do it justice. you can skip the intro with the smiling jolly guy but if you want to really read this post, you'll need an hour. It's not written in internet time. ;)

Quote of the Day

2009-04-19T06:46:00.001-05:00

"Sometimes you gotta throat fuck the devil to get what you want in this world."
- Jesus of Nazareth, Gospel of Bobo the Pimp 22:3

Use the force, Luke.

2009-04-12T10:31:00.007-05:00

a fun way to spend a few minutes. I got to a point where I could switch back and forth pretty quickly - within a few seconds or so. My default was clockwise. I actually, for what seemed like periods of less than a second, could get it to spin both ways at once, but it was unsustainable because I would immediately become way to giddy at the experience.

http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,22535838-5012895,00.html

An essay of sorts

2009-04-10T18:09:00.016-05:00

I. Introduction:
a haiku

the thought is always
the same, an incomplete phrase
incapable of

II. In other words:
a deconstruction of my introductory haiku
or
What I meant when I said that was this:
a reiteration that may confound the matter but is necessary nonetheless
or
In case I wasn’t clear:
an attempt to speak to another who by now has stopped reading because doing so has become tedious
or
why it’s difficult to say what one means

Immediately I am confusing things. Raising questions in the mind of the reader. What thought? How is it the same? What is it incapable of? Is this a typo? I will take these questions one at a time and in an order that makes sense. Perhaps.

1. What thought?

Thought operates in this haiku as a reference without a referent, semantically speaking. Of course, how else can one speak but semantically?

In practice, the reader presumes from the phrasing that the object of the reference, that is the thought itself, will be illuminated by further authorial iterations. But we all know what happens when one presumes, don’t we?

Right. One makes a pres out of u and mes.

The habits of language are strong and urge us forward, taking leaps of faith with the author if we think s/he might be speaking to us or might speak to us in the future. The reader continues without difficulty under the assumption, mistaken as it may be, that the author will illuminate the meaning of the first phrase via phrases to follow, that words piled upon words will somehow mean something if we pile them high enough and keep climbing. But like Yertle’s kingdom, a pile of words is only as strong as the gastric usurpations of its most oppressed subject: the belchings of an unfree man.

“Yes, yes, man,” I hear myself say. “Move on, already. Iterate. ‘Tis but child’s play.”

To which I reply, “Waiting is.”

But I do have a point. This is becoming a bit tedious. It’s not a game of Clue, after all. Who is the killer? Is it definite article concrete noun prepositional phrase prepositional phrase? The suspense is killing me. All puns intended.

2. How is it the same?

The Passion of the Peep

2009-04-10T10:41:00.002-05:00

2009-04-09T06:40:00.001-05:00

Click on photo for larger image

Poem

2009-04-04T06:05:00.009-05:00

“Danger, Will Robinson!”

Space,
the final frontier;
speech,
the first metaphor.

Denotation.
Connotation.
Meditation
by the sea;
Anonymous-
you and me.

I carve this space
to express myself
but one self
cannot be
expressed:
the safe self.
A private self
on a shelf
near a can expired
and marked
frijoles,
I'll be
speaking
of containers
and boxes
and the way
things
mean.

Signs of life abound
even here,
among the dead,
where the worms writhe.
The mind
cannot be excised,
'twould be too taxing
on the body.

All puns intended.

Intentionality
separates us
from
the beasts,
our selves,
our others.

Why ours?

Because
all we have is ours
and nothing is free
but that which is
no thing.
What thing are you?

And me?

Dare we
associate?

Freely?

Intentionality
is all we have;
like love and memory,
ours or theirs,
it is the currency
of God.

Signification.
Connotation.
Shifting denotation.

Speech,
the final metaphor;
space,
the first frontier.

The speech of machines
means nothing to them;
of history
but without memory,
they flounder,
stuck on stupid.
Or, if you prefer
the finer things:
“full of sound and fury,
signifying nothing.”

Either way,
they speak of nothing.
For no thing can speak
but that which is
no thing.

Prepositions and pronouns

2009-03-23T18:12:00.003-05:00

God works
in mysterious ways,
and God gives
and then he takes
from me.
- Jenny Lewis, Born Secular

Funny Ha Ha

2009-03-22T11:27:00.002-05:00

Quote of the Day

2009-03-21T09:55:00.012-05:00

"In my humble opinion, we're all fucked."
- Socrates

Theoxigenises reports that these were in fact the dying words of the famous Greek thinker in his newly-discovered text, Assofunmeus Guffawaeus.

Theoxigenises, the youngest brother of Plato, born of the brief but passionate union of Plato's father, Ariston, and one of Ariston's slave girls, Trodupon, (celebrated in the poetry of the great Greek tragedian, Genitalianis), is one of the lesser-known Socratic students.

Scholars disagree on the precise teachings of Theoxigenises and many have dismissed his interpretations of Socrates' dialogues as misguided at best and outright deranged at worst. Recently discovered DNA evidence suggests that Theoxigenises actually suffered from ADHD, which may explain the at times disjointed iterations of Socrates' teachings in Theoxigenises' writings.

I awake a ‘merikin

2009-03-21T07:30:00.004-05:00

I awake and I see you, ‘merika!
Waving your foam finger –
a die-hard fan –
for fear of failure.

I awake and walk your streets
full of belching engines driven by
morbidly obese homeless men;
even in poverty, you are gluttonous.

I awake and I see you, ‘merika,
in your offices, your homes,
your home offices
with degrees strung up
on accent walls,
wringing your hands
over the latest news
showing
your man, your market,
your team, your target,
your dow industrial, GDP,
ERA, NRA, UCLA,
ACLU, IRA, GLBT, WMD,
fundamentalist, activist,
sexist, racist, homophobic,
radical, terrorist, enemy
combatant, immigrant,
your us and them,
your name here,
up or down in the polls.

I awake and ride your trains
full of sour vapid faces –
ears on cell phones and ipods,
eyes bent to glowing screens,
fingers frantically texting,
afraid to speak but to one self,
afraid of others’ smiles.

I awake and stand, ‘merika,
amidst your touring throngs marveling
at the quarter billion dollar bean
and see my own reflection there,
guitar in hand, wondering, “what?”

I awake and sing, ‘merika!
A song of my own making,
written by you.
My shame and pride
are yours and mine.
My failings, yours; yours, mine.
I am of you,
I am among you,
I speak your tongue, ‘merika!

You cannot blame me
more than I blame myself;
we share it equally.

I awake a ‘merikin
and wonder where I can
go
that rhymes and rhythms
will not sound
shallow
and hollow,
but ring hallowed,
heard by more than one
and sung by many tongues;
I awake a ‘merikin,
and dream American,
wondering, “what?”

2009-02-24T20:22:00.005-06:00

Turn the Page
No right way.
No one thing.
Nothing left to do.
No one tool; no right way.
Nothing that he knew.

Can't sit still;
had my fill
of drinking swill. I'm
taking clues
from the blues
and from the swinging sun.

In twilight time
and in his prime
when inspiration came
he bit his heel
and swole his thumb
and always came up lame.

The arrows point
to places past
and things that can't explain
the twisting reach of Adam's grasp,
the asp, the ox, the King.

In taking back the last embrace
he wants to show the strings
of puppeteers and drinking flasks,
the flat of Saturn's rings.

Socrates Quote of the Day

2008-10-11T11:50:00.001-05:00

The shortest and surest way to live with honour in the world, is to be in reality what we would appear to be; and if we observe, we shall find, that all human virtues increase and strengthen themselves by the practice of them.

Funny Ha Ha

2008-09-28T07:50:00.001-05:00

The Great Schlep from The Great Schlep on Vimeo.

America: You've Come A Long Way, Baby!

2008-09-16T12:59:00.010-05:00

A waffle mix being pawned off as political speech alongside an ad from 1930s-40s.

Lawsee, lawsee! We 'marekins sho is fucked up!

See more here: CNN video

Good Piece on White Privilege

2008-09-15T12:50:00.003-05:00

Tim Wise on White Privilege

Today's Image

2008-09-10T07:29:00.002-05:00

Incentivizing Killing

2008-09-08T09:25:00.010-05:00

Woo hoo! This woman is great!

Salon article: Her deadly wolf program

Maybe we could institute Palin's program on a human scale to solve the country's immigrant and black problem.

Great Response to Sarah Palin's Community Organizer comment

2008-09-08T08:39:00.001-05:00

A photographic tribute to Rothko

2008-09-02T10:25:00.006-05:00

Today's images

2008-08-29T06:15:00.009-05:00

This bird waited for me to get my camera...

before flying away.

Today's Images

2008-08-20T08:02:00.005-05:00

One person's trash....

Is another's treasure:

Trying AdSense

2008-08-17T08:01:00.004-05:00

to see if it makes sense.

I'm not selling out,
just trying to see
if I can make money
by you reading me.

If not, o well;
if so, what the hell?
It's not like my message
is one of mess-age
and massacre;
I just want to write
the truth ruth
to be a poet
and not know it
and maybe amass(an)acre
or maybe a mule.

As Randy Newman once said,
"It's money that I love."
He was being sardonic or ironic; I'm
just being a smart dick and aleck -
if you click
than this dick
can keep on typing
and hypin'
and sayin' what he wants...

peace out.

The NRA doesn't understand punctuation

2008-08-13T16:51:00.007-05:00

Despite their love of semi-automatics, card-carrying NRA members have no idea how to use a semi-colon. Their slogan, "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" fucks up fundamental punctuation in a deliberate attempt to manipulate the meaning beneath the sentence. The sentence appears to be absolutely sound until you realize that the two thoughts are actually two complete sentences. When one wants to combine two complete sentences into one phrase, one uses a semi-colon as in, "I haven't been feeling myself lately; my stomach has been bothering me." This is the proper use of a semi-colon and the proper way to combine these two complete sentences into one complete juxtapositional phrase - the second half of which adds to the meaning or enhances the meaning of the first. I learned this in College from a very strict (and brilliant) poetry professor. So, let's break down the slogan. The two thoughts expressed are in fact two complete sentences:

1. Guns don't kill people.
2. People kill people.

Both are true in and of themselves. Guns can't kill people - they have no ability to make decisions or take action on their own - they are machines and require an operator to operate them. Even calling guns "them" reveals a limitation in our language that I don't know how to overcome without being overly wordy. Guns are not "them"s, just objects which require subjects (human subjects) to operate "them."

People kill people all the time. In fact, they require no machine to kill people but the machine which they inhabit, and that machine is the human body.

So. Both thoughts are complete sentences and both are absolutely true in and of themselves. It's when you try to combine these two thoughts that you end up with what is, in essence, a lie - a manipulation.

The meaning that gun advocates would like you to take away from the phrase "Guns don't kill people, people kill people" is that guns require an operator to kill. This is true without the second half of the phrase. In fact, the second half becomes irrelevant if this is truly what they want to tell us. It is inherent in the first thought.

Now, let's give these people the benefit of the doubt and let's say that they actually do understand that a semi-colon is required to make this a grammatically correct phrase. Let's examine the meaning of "Guns don't kill people; people kill people."

What is the rule about semi-colons from above? A semi-colon divides two complete sentences to create one complete sentence in such a way that the two sentences are juxtaposed, thereby adding to the meaning of each. This is simply untrue of this phrase, even if one does use a semi-colon instead of the usual comma we see when this phrase is in print. These phrases juxtaposed add nothing to each other. They have actually no relationship except for the repetition of the two words "people" and "kill."

What gun advocates hope is that the additional phrase will act as an emphasis for the inherent meaning of the first sentence - emphasizing the fact that guns, in and of themselves, do not kill people. Has anyone ever argued that they do? Are there any rational people out there who say we should not have guns in the world because one day the machines may decide to rise up and revolt?

"So," I imagine hearing you ask, "how would one make a coherent sentence by using a semi-colon to juxtapose these two thoughts and add to the meaning of each thought on each side of the semi-colon?"

Well, I respond self-assuredly, I will show you how and then you can write me and tell me what you think.

Here are two complete sentences that when juxtaposed via a semi-colon create new meaning in each:

Guns don't kill people; people who use guns to kill people kill people.

Each thought is a complete sentence with a truth value all its own. Juxtaposing these two sentences creates new meaning for each sentence. Some of the new meanings we might derive from this juxtaposition are as follows:

1. When people kill people with guns, they should go to jail.

2. People who have a tendency to kill people with guns should not be allowed to own guns.

3. Guns whose only purpose is to kill people should not be available for sale to the general public.

4. If you own a gun and someone takes it from you and you didn't have it secure, you're just as liable for any death or property damage that person does as you would be had you given them the gun, unless you attempted to mitigate the damage that might be caused by attempting to keep them from taking the gun from you. You don't have to die to keep them from taking it but you have to make every reasonable effort.

I don't have time to list all the conclusions cause I have to go... but please feel free to add your own in comments. My last conclusion is this:

5. When people shoot people in the face, they should be held accountable.

6. Supreme court justices who hunt with vice presidential candidates should recuse themselves from deciding whether that vice president's presidential running mate will win a contested presidential election.

7. As Stephen Colbert might say, the headline to this story should be "What the fuck? Are you serious? Are people really this fucking stupid?":
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080813/ap_on_re_us/democratic_party_shooting

Breasts

2008-08-08T03:07:00.022-05:00

Free photos for websites - FreeDigitalPhotos.net

More proof that God exists

2008-08-04T17:18:00.004-05:00

Very weird. II

2008-08-02T19:01:00.008-05:00

I opened up my dashboard to blog today and had a message from blogspot that was titled: "YOU ARE NOT SPAM"

And I was like, how do they know? And then I was like, thank god, cause I don't want to be spam. And then I was like, what the hell are they talking about? And then I was like, "Like, shut up dumbhead!"

Today's Image

2008-08-01T06:43:00.004-05:00

Credit: 8-1-08 New York Times

Golden Arches of Death

2008-07-30T06:14:00.007-05:00

Here's a creative public policy approach.

L.A.: No new fast-food outlets in poor area

Good Government

The law is ours to make, they say.
But they are us and we are they;
we must speak with truth
cause they don't know who Good is.

Dick

2008-07-19T20:36:00.004-05:00

Another in the laundry list of reasons why Cheney should be brought up on charges in the International Criminal Court in the Hague:
Electrical Risks at Iraq Bases Are Worse Than Said

Youthful Innocence

2008-07-01T09:41:00.004-05:00

Guns don't kill people, the puritanical war on drugs and sex kills people.

Public Radio story on gun violence and students in Chicago.

"Why can't you sell the shit and walk the fuck away? Everything else in this country gets sold without shooting people behind it." - Jimmy McNulty, The Wire.

Of course, the reality is much greyer, but that doesn't make McNulty's statement untrue, just less definite.

PS: If you haven't watched The Wire, you should. Netflix is a beautiful thing.

(sung) What the world needs now...

2008-06-26T10:04:00.004-05:00

is guns, more guns.

The Supreme Court has done it again. Peace in our time!

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/business/AP-Scotus-Guns.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Hopefully this ruling will give a boost to the concerned citizens of South Carolina who want to allow students of all ages to carry handguns to schools: http://news.ccpblogs.com/2008/06/02/bring-your-gun-to-school-day-redux/.

Ah, America. Land of the free, home of the headshot.

I'm all for individual ownership of guns, as long as we stick to Jefferson's adage that periodic revolution, "at least once every 20 years, ... [is] a medicine necessary for the sound health of government." How does Scalia use originalism to interpret that? Does he think he and his comfortably wide backside would retain power in such a scenario?

John McCain- the water-carrying Maverick

2008-06-17T21:57:00.001-05:00

Some Cost-saving Ideas for the Airlines

2008-05-22T09:57:00.014-05:00

Yesterday's news about American Airlines deciding to charge travelers for the first piece of checked luggage, and the general trend in the business toward charging for all things that used to come with the purchase of a ticket, got me thinking about some other creative ways airlines could start saving money in these hard times. Here are the top ten I came up with:

10. Coin-operated restroom doors on the plane, like public toilets in France. I suggest 25 cents to start.

9. If you're going to make the restroom doors coin-operated, why not take it that next logical step? Coin-operated toilet paper, sinks, soap, and paper towels. 25 cents each. Sure, this means if you only have 50 cents you have to choose, but how often do you really need more than two of these items? Tear the paper towel in half and it can do double duty!

8. For budget travelers, an adult diaper could be sold for 75 cents. That's a savings of 50 cents over using the bathroom and cleaning up afterwards! Add a dollar to that savings and you could get yourself a:

7. seatbelt.

6. Coin-operated overhead reading lamps. 15mins for a quarter or 1hr 15min for a dollar.

5. Floating and non-floating seat cushion sections on the plane. Seriously, how likely is it that you're going to crash over water AND survive? I'd take that bet for a $5 savings. That's four full-service trips to the bathroom! Or three full-service trips and a:

4. $1.25 glass of ice water. (A bargain considering ice and water are sold separately for 75 cents each.)

3. Of course, peanuts and overstock test-market snack crackers would have to be paid for, but you need not even worry about that cost if you opt out of the:

2. 10% flight attendant fee on each ticket.

And finally, in the tradition of David Letterman, the number one way airlines could make some much-needed extra cash:

1. A "Frequent Breather Membership Card." For just $100 a year, travelers can join the Frequent Breather club and have much-needed oxygen pumped to their seat as they fly. The infrastructure for this program already exists- overhead fans. All the airlines would have to do is de-pressurize the cabin and pump oxygen only to those who have paid for it. That's right, while your fellow passengers are passing out from hypoxia in diapers filled with their own waste, you can breathe easy and relax knowing that you're a Frequent Breather.

A Supreme Court that doesn't suck.

2008-05-16T10:22:00.005-05:00

That would be the California Supreme Court. CA's Supreme Court decision in In re marriage cases was a bright spot this week amid the suffering, dying, and soulless acts of inhumanity that normally pass for news. I couldn't help but smile and feel silly that I was getting choked up as I washed the dishes and listened to an older lesbian talk about texting a marriage proposal to her partner. Who says romance is dead? "how r u will u mrry me :)" Did I mention I felt silly? But it really felt like a moment to celebrate - Rationality is not completely dead. There are still some embers under all that cold ash; you just have to poke it a little, blow on it, add some small kindling and it can ignite. Not the best metaphor I've ever come up with, but the best my mind offers up to me at this moment.

Then, of course, I had to listen to the reactions of those who were disappointed by the ruling. I can't find the quote online, but one person said something like, "The framers of the California Constitution never could have imagined that same-sex marriage would one day be protected." To me, this statement merely highlights the limits of human imagination as opposed to the 'common sense' wisdom it purports to impart. First, if we accept it as true, it is merely a fact among many in the history of human imagination - like saying that at one time the movement of heavenly bodies didn't accommodate the notion that the earth moved around the sun. The statement has no bearing on the truth or falsity of whether the word marriage contains within it the capacity to encompass same-sex unions. In addition, it indicates a lack of imagination on the part of the speaker - that the speaker cannot imagine a framer who could imagine marriage encompassing the concept of 'same-sex unions.' All framers, of the U.S. Constitution and of the California Constitution, were undoubtedly fairly intelligent human beings or, at least, as intelligent as present-day people. If presented with the argument of the majority opinion in In re marriage cases, all the framers could indeed imagine the concept encompassing same-sex marriage. They may not agree, but they certainly could imagine it.

To come, perhaps: a detailed discussion of the logic of the decision and the real issue at the heart of it - a battle between representative and direct democracy. Doesn't that sound exciting? It does to me. But I often read Kant and Whitehead to relax. I forgive you if you don't share my enthusiasm.

The All Important Bigot Vote

2008-05-14T11:14:00.005-05:00

The title of this post comes from a Jon Stewart sketch. In the wake of West Virginia we're told once again that Obama cannot win among white working-class voters, those "hard-working Americans," as Clinton referred to them in her interview with USA Today, who contribute to this country, unlike all those Obama supporters, a coalition of African Americans and Daily Show watching drunken stoner slackers. Is this seriously Clinton's argument for why she should be the nominee? Didn't Obama win the Democratic primaries in Idaho and Wyoming? The largely white populations in those states must either be lazy or un-American. And does she not care at all whether African-Americans vote this November? Obama's support among African-Americans is upwards of 90%. Clinton takes the vote so much for granted she doesn't put any credence in the argument that black voters might feel disenfranchised if a bunch of party bigwigs overturned their vote for the nominee. For all her preaching about democracy and not wanting to disenfranchise voters, she seems perfectly willing to do so if it means she wins. Michigan is a perfect example. She would have the Michigan delegates seated proportionate to the votes the candidates received when Obama wasn't even on the ballot. That left Obama supporters with the choice to vote 'uncommitted' or to vote in the Republican primary to mess with their results.

Again, I think she needs to stay in this race until June just to keep her supporters from protesting the November election. But her campaigning disgusts me. I'm tired of the say-anything, insult anyone, whatever's expedient attitude of the Clintons. Like the opportunistic originalism of Scalia, they cherry-pick whatever supports their position and to hell with whether their arguments are consistent or coherent. Winning at all costs. Let's hope the next few weeks go quickly and we can move on to defeating John McCain instead of fighting his surrogate, Hillary Clinton.

Jeremiah Wright

2008-04-30T12:25:00.007-05:00

I am troubled by this guy, but not only for the run of the mill reasons concerning his effect on Obama. Of course, his decision to come out into the spotlight at this particular moment angers me. He seems not to care much whether Obama is president, but is instead interested in using his 15 minutes to preach the word of God as he understands it. But the issue of timing in this campaign season aside, I think Wright is better than this performer he has become and I wish that he could rise to his own rhetoric.

I have very little trouble understanding that there was a causal connection between American foreign policy and the attacks of 9/11. There is much debate about what Wright is quoting when he says he is quoting Ambassador Edward Peck in his sermon after 9/11 and I have not been able to find any credible source that can show a transcript or video of the Fox News interview that Wright is referring to. Regardless, I am not offended by the "chickens coming home to roost" comment, either. It is something said out of anger and frustration, and there is plenty of that to go around. The righteousness with which it is said is troubling to me, but that in and of itself is not what makes Wright's sermon problematic. What makes his blaming of America for the terrorism attacks of 9/11 problematic is that he does not, in the sermon or anywhere else I can find, say anything about the terrorists' use of God.

The sermon revolves around Psalm 137, specifically the line that says, "Happy shall he be who takes your little ones and dashes them against the rock!" (Revised Standard, Oxford Annotated, slightly different than the language Wright uses) He invokes this psalm to demonstrate where we should not go as Americans. He had seen a number of public religious services and the implicit calls for revenge in the pleas for God to bless our military in doing "what they gotta do," and he was troubled by this. He insists in the sermon that God does not want us to turn our anger on the innocents, that "violence begets violence, terrorism begets terrorism." But while he talks about how America has wronged Others of all stripes, he never once talks about how God fits into the terrorists' thinking, and that the terrorists have got God wrong just as we've got God wrong if we use His name as we enact our revenge for 9/11. In his interview with Bill Moyers, he explains black liberation theology in the following way:

The God of the people who [are] riding on the decks of the slave ship is not the God of the people who are riding underneath the decks as slaves in chains. If the God you're praying to, "Bless our slavery" is not the God to whom these people are praying, saying, "God, get us out of slavery." And it's not like Notre Dame playing Michigan. You're saying flip a coin; hope God blesses the winning team, no. That the perception of God who allows slavery, who allows rape, who allows misogyny, who allows sodomy, who allows murder of a people, lynching, that's not the God of the people being lynched and sodomized and raped, and carried away into a foreign country. Same thing you find in Psalm 137. That those people who are carried away into slavery have a very different concept of what it means to be the people of God than the ones who carried them away.

Now this is an insightful and profound understanding of how God and religion work in the minds of oppressors v. those of the oppressed. It follows an explication of how after every revolution, the winners write the history, so we Americans don't learn history from the point of view of the American Indian, we don't learn history from the point of view of the black slave, we learn it from the point of view of the founders. (This is, of course, not as true today as it once was.)

The trouble with his sermon and the trouble with what he's said to 'correct' the misunderstanding of his message in the past few days, is that while he explains how America has oppressed and how God does not bless the despicable acts of America or America's revenge on the innocent (our war in Afghanistan can arguably be characterized this way, and clearly Iraq can) and he explains how the oppressed view God differently, he never takes it that next step and says that God does not bless the terrorists' acts either. It is implicit in the sermon he gives, but the sermon leaves you with the distinct impression that not only does America reap what it has sown, but that the terrorists may have been justified and that God is angry with America. When this is clearly NOT the message he wants to convey to his congregation. America's indignation and misapprehension of its culpability does not excuse the terrorists' acts on 9/11, and this is what people are responding to when they hear this sermon.

What's lacking in Wright's sermon and in his characterization of America and its enemies is that America, in Wright's world, seems to be the only power that is damned by God. What he fails to acknowledge is that the terrorists have used their power in a manner that God would damn as well. I don't think his saying that would make a difference in terms of the media and the hype, but I am disappointed in him for not making this simple move. But, then, he is only human. As are we all.

The Charm and Wit of Antonin

2008-04-30T11:48:00.000-05:00

I am a textualist. I am an originalist. I am not a nut.

2008-04-28T10:38:00.007-05:00

"My Constitution is not living, it is dead." (quote attributed to Scalia in NPR story)

I began working on this post thinking I was going to write about what a jerk Antonin Scalia is by commenting on the first of three interviews with him on NPR this morning, but that led me to begin to research him some more and instead of just writing about what a jerk he is, I decided to explore the core of his Jerkness.

Justice Scalia adheres to a school of thought called originalism when it comes to the Constitution. This school of thought holds that the Constitution means whatever the framers thought it meant. So, in deciding whether something is Constitutional, we first look to the 'plain meaning' of the language of the Constitution. The 'plain meaning' is the meaning a 'reasonable man' would have applied at the time of the framing. (Everyone knows there were no 'reasonable women' at the time of the Constitution's framing.) To discern plain meaning we look to writings of that time, including dictionaries and, centrally, the writing of the framers. All well and good, except when we do that we find that the framers had serious disagreements over what the Constitution meant and should mean. In this type of situation, one assumes, the majority rules - in other words, whatever most of the founders thought is what the Constitution means. (I'm open to being corrected on this if anyone knows different) Once this process is complete, Scalia and others claim that their reading, unlike all other readings, is not an act of interpretation, rather it is the Truth. This is obviously a reductionist version of originalism, but I don't have time to write a thesis (despite evidence to the contrary given the seemingly thesis-length posts I've written from time to time).

This understanding of the Constitution is limited enough, but the apparent basis of Scalia's understanding of the Constitution's authority and the authority of the framers is even more difficult for me to swallow. In speaking on the death penalty to the University of Chicago Divinity School, Scalia discusses the morality of the death penalty and says that if a judge believed that the death penalty was immoral, then that judge would necessarily have to recuse himself from deciding death penalty cases (or perhaps resign altogether). Thankfully, Scalia does not find the death penalty immoral so he can keep his job. His reasoning? Look to the Bible:

Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to the evil. Wilt thou then not be afraid of the power? Do that which is good, and thou shalt have praise of the same: for he is the minister of God to thee for good. But if thou do that which is evil, be afraid; for he beareth not the sword in vain: for he is the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil. Wherefore ye must needs be subject, not only for wrath, but also for conscience sake. (Romans 13:1-5)

After quoting this passage, Scalia goes on to say that "the core of [St. Paul's] message is that government - however you want to limit that concept - derives its moral authority from God. It is the 'minister of God' with powers to 'revenge,' to 'execute wrath,' including even wrath by the sword (which is unmistakably a reference to the death penalty)." Further on, he says that this reasoning has been the consensus until very recent times:

That consensus has been upset, I think, by the emergence of democracy. It is easy to see the hand of the Almighty behind rulers whose forebears, in the dim mists of history, were supposedly anointed by God, or who at least obtained their thrones in awful and unpredictable battles whose outcome was determined by the Lord of Hosts, that is, the Lord of Armies. It is much more difficult to see the hand of God-or any higher moral authority-behind the fools and rogues (as the losers would have it) whom we ourselves elect to do our own will. How can their power to avenge-to vindicate the “public order”-be any greater than our own?

According to Scalia, this attitude toward democracy, as less ordained by God than other forms of government, also results in horrible things such as civil disobedience. And still further on, he says, "The reaction of people of faith to this tendency of democracy to obscure the divine authority behind government should not be resignation to it, but the resolution to combat it as effectively as possible."

All of this is disturbing from the point of view of an agnostic, or whatever the hell it is that I am. I'm sure it is also disturbing to anyone who believes that leaders such as Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. were doing God's work. But it does allow us to uncover the incoherent principle which seems, on some level, to inform the Constitutional interpretation of Scalia: God loves winners.

All power proceeds from God, according to the passage Scalia quotes. The 'plain meaning' of this, according to Scalia, is that those who are in power are ordained by God, because they could not have gained power if God was not 'on their side.' Of course, this logic obtains no matter how seemingly evil or foolish a government may seem to us 'losers,' it is God's will and we should obey. But, by the logic of Scalia's "reading" of the Bible, if those who do not obey overthrow the government, then they clearly had God on their side, or at least at the moment of their 'winning,' God became their number one fan. And since God loves the winner, and the founding fathers were winners, then God loved the founding fathers. Therefore, whatever they thought was what God loves. The overriding principle that the founding fathers seemed to believe in was democracy. Therefore, God loves democracy. And since in a democracy, majority rules, then when we look to see what the founders thought (and thus what God thought), then we look to see what the majority of the founding fathers thought. Ding ding ding! That majority wins! Case closed.

Of course, Scalia's God-loves-winners (and, apparently, simple majorities) theory doesn't seem to dissuade him from expressing his opinions when the majority on the court goes against him, but I'm sure he has an equally circular theory of evil to cover those cases.

Alton Logan

2008-04-25T10:50:00.003-05:00

Last weekend, Alton Logan was released on bail after spending 26 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit. (NYT article) News of wrongful convictions are almost commonplace these days with the advent of DNA evidence. But this case was different. In this case, two public defenders knew of Logan's innocence all along because of the confession of their client, Andrew Wilson.

It is often said that the creed at the heart of our legal system, with its elaborate due process protections, is that it is better that 10 guilty men go free than one innocent man be imprisoned. (Why 10? I don't know. For a discussion of that, see this blowhard.) In fact, it is some variation on this admittedly cliche sentiment that inspires the work of many public defenders - that our system should err on the side of protecting the innocent, that everyone deserves legal representation (well, every criminal anyway - if you're losing your home or having your children taken away by the state you have no right to counsel, but that's a subject for another post). And I think our legal system does lean more toward protecting the innocent than many around the world. But the story of Alton Logan sheds light on an instance where the 'system' not only failed to protect, but contributed to the suffering of an innocent man.

The issue at the center of this story is attorney-client privilege and the ethical responsibility of attorneys to keep their clients' confidences. (There is a difference between these two concepts which only attorneys would care about. I use them interchangeably for the purpose of this post.) The two attorneys, W. Jameson Kunz and Dale Coventry, make several arguments as to why they couldn't reveal the confidence until now: the rules of professional conduct prohibited it, they couldn't do it without harming their client, the system would grind to a halt if clients thought attorneys could reveal confidences, and it wouldn't have made a difference because it wouldn't have been allowed into court due to privilege.

I could say I am of two minds on this, but that would be overstating how I feel. My sentiments are expressed in the words of Alton Logan when asked if he could sympathize with the two attorneys who couldn't say anything without putting their client in jeopardy: "Sympathize with it? Yes. Understand it? No."

The two attorneys for Andrew Wilson were, in their view, barred from revealing this information under the Illinois Rules of Professional Conduct (IRPC). I say "in their view," but there is wide agreement on this point among those who deal in rules of professional conduct, so these attorneys are not alone.

The relevant rule, IRPC1.6, subjects an attorney to discipline for revealing confidences or secrets disclosed by clients. There are exceptions, but preventing the life imprisonment of an innocent man is not one of them. (Note: the rules I cite are the newer rules because I couldn't find the text of those in place in 1982 online and I am fairly certain the analysis holds for both versions. Not good enough for a legal memorandum, but good enough for my blog.)

The first exception: attorneys must disclose confidences to prevent the client from committing acts that would result in "death or serious bodily injury." (Note that these are future acts of commission. A reasonable argument could be made that not confessing would result in "death or serious bodily harm" because the risk of death or serious bodily harm in prison is very high. But not confessing is an act of omission rather than commission.) Second, attorneys may reveal the intent of clients to commit lessor crimes. Third, attorneys may also reveal confidences when permitted under the rules of professional conduct and when required by law. (Note that we "may" reveal confidences when required by law - we are not required to.) And my favorite exception of all: we may reveal confidences when the client doesn't pay our bill. IRPC1.6(c)(3). Now, I will grant you that I have not been able to come up with a plausible hypothetical in which revealing a client's confession of a murder would be "necessary to establish or collect" an attorney's fees, but I think this is merely a failure of imagination on my part and not an inherent strength of the rule itself. In the end, it is pretty clear that the rules of professional conduct did not offer these attorneys an out. But this doesn't mean there was no out.

W. Jameson Kunz says, in the 60 minutes interview, "I [could not] figure out a way and still cannot figure out a way how we could have done anything to help Alton Logan that would not have put Andrew Wilson in jeopardy." But in the same interview they claim that their revelation would not have been helpful to Alton Logan because it wouldn't be allowed into evidence due to attorney-client privilege. These two statements contradict one another to a certain degree. How could evidence that would not be allowed into evidence harm their client?

Now, revelation of the confession might have led investigators to re-open the case and actually find evidence linking the crime to Wilson. (physical evidence did exist linking Wilson). Whether this evidence would have been allowed in is an open question. Maybe. Maybe not. The gathering of the evidence would have been based upon an inadmissible confession, so it would have to be argued. I don't claim to know the rules of evidence well enough to dismiss this possibility. But on its face, the claim that the confession would not help Logan but would hurt Wilson seems incongruous. Add to that the fact that Wilson was eventually sentenced to life without parole in the crime he was being tried for, and the question becomes even less clear as to what 'harm' would have befell their client. True, he could have been put to death. My opinion of the death penalty as punishment aside, he would have been put to death for a crime he committed. Is this more or less harmful than being imprisoned for life for a crime one didn't commit?

The final reason these attorneys offer for their 26 year silence is that the system would grind to a halt if they were to reveal their client's confidence. The argument is that if clients think attorneys can reveal confidences with impunity, then they will not be honest with their attorneys and the attorneys cannot then make the best case for their client. This seems a reasonable enough argument as far as it goes, but it doesn't really wash in the context of such serious consequences (Should innocent men really be punished to protect the secrets of guilty men? Should clients expect that their crimes would be kept secret in these circumstances?) and it seems once again to contradict another thing the two attorneys said, that had Logan received the death penalty they would have revealed the confidence by appealing to the governor to stop the execution. In fact, Coventry went to the courthouse the day the jury was deciding the sentencing phase in the first of Logan's trials. As quoted by the associated press, "It's pretty creepy watching people deciding if they're going to kill an innocent man." I'll bet. (A new Fox reality show in the making perhaps?) So, the system is too precious to be toyed with to keep a man from what Logan himself called "a slow death, a lingering death," but not so important that these two attorneys would have allowed an innocent man to be put to death. This seems to be a difference without much of a distinction. Kunz and Coventry would undoubtedly argue that at least with life in prison there's still the possibility of freedom.

As difficult as it is, I find myself wanting to refrain from judging these two men, two young attorneys at the beginning of their careers who had to choose between being able to continue practicing in an area of law that they no doubt felt called to do on some level (no one chooses to be a public defender for the pay) and protecting the life of an innocent man. I think if there is any judgment to be made it is that neither of them seem to admit, even to this day, that this was the calculus at the heart of their decision. There is no question that the American or Illinois legal system would not have ground to a halt had they revealed this confidence because they likely would have been disbarred, or at least severely disciplined, and this would have communicated to would-be clients that their secrets were safe with attorneys. And as far as ethical dangers regarding causing their clients harm; these concerns are overridden by the moral dangers and justice concerns involved in letting innocent men be imprisoned. There was a path to Logan's freedom, but it passed straight through the careers of these two attorneys.

But the fault does not lie with these two attorneys alone. The fault also lies with a system that forced them to make this very difficult choice. There has to be a way to incorporate exceptions to the ethics rules to protect serious threats to liberty and life. In fact the current ABA model rules of professional responsibility do a much better job of this, allowing attorneys to reveal confidences "relating to a client's representation... to prevent reasonably certain death or substantial bodily harm." This is a much broader protection for clients because it covers not just 'confidences' and 'secrets' but anything relating to a client's representation, but it also does a better job of serving justice in situations like this because it does not require that the confidence relate to future affirmative acts of the client.

Institutions will always be imperfect and will always result in hurtful imbalances of power. However, institutions exist to serve humans, humans do not exist to serve institutions. It is our obligation to remain alert to opportunities for institutional reform and to act accordingly. And, although I hope I am never in such a situation, I also hope that I would be able to speak the truth whether it was institutionally safe to do so or not.

Presenting... The Media as Capt. Renault

2008-04-21T11:46:00.004-05:00

This week's Sunday New York Times ran an article exposing that many of the so-called experts regularly appearing as "military analysts" on television, radio, and in newspapers since before the Iraq war were (gasp!) Pentagon puppets. As one former analyst described it, "It was [the Pentagon] saying, 'We need to stick our hands up your back and move your mouth for you.'" One can only imagine which orifice the Pentagon used to obtain access to the spines of these military analysts.

There are wonderful laugh lines in the article, including the depiction of retired military brass being wooed by "uniformed escorts to Mr. Rumsfeld's private conference room" and lunches where "the best government china [was] laid out" and seating was arranged using "embossed name cards." Of course, it took more than a little Martha Stewart charm (military-style) to lube the former military brass for their puppetry. Inside access (all puns intended) to the Pentagon and hefty defense contracts for their private business ventures sealed the deal. As one analyst said regarding their access to the military market, "It was like being embedded with the Pentagon leadership." (emphasis provided) But more disturbing than the propaganda machine "exposed" by the Times article (I mean, is any reader actually surprised by the "psyops on steroids" that the Pentagon was/is engaged in?) is the unconvincing feigned shock the NY Times is implicitly engaging in. Thus, the reference to Casablanca in the title of this post.

For those who don't remember (or never saw) the movie, Capt. Renault (Claude Rains) is a local corrupt police captain and Nazi accommodater (though he turns quasi-good-guy in the end). There is a scene where the police raid Rick's Cafe, and Rick (Bogart) confronts Capt. Renault:

Rick: How can you close me up? On what grounds?
Captain Renault: I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!
[a croupier hands Renault a pile of money]
Croupier: Your winnings, sir.
Captain Renault: [sotto voce] Oh, thank you very much.
[aloud]
Captain Renault: Everybody out at once!

The NY Times and the media at large are like Capt. Renault raiding Rick's Cafe - shocked, shocked! This article made waves across the mediascape yesterday (and will no doubt continue to) as the public faces of various media outlets expressed outrage that the Pentagon would dare to engage in such underhanded tactics. Meanwhile, there is little in the article or in other coverage I've seen that turns the lens back on the media itself to contemplate its own culpability in this. Where were the lower-thirds on CNN, ABC, NBC, MSNBC (Fox, obviously, doesn't count) identifying these 'analysts' as consultants to or partners in companies competing for military contracts? Why didn't NPR introduce them in their current capacity as opposed to "Retired General so-and-so says...?" The fourth branch, as the media is sometimes referred to, has fallen and it can't get up. Of course, the first step toward getting up is admitting that you've fallen, and the media won't even do that.

Now, I'm sure there will be half-hearted gestures of mea culpa and reflection over the next few days, just as the Times article devoted a dozen or so paragraphs in a three and a half page story to what might appear, perhaps, to be a lack of vigilance on the part of the media. But it will be brief (after all, the PA primary is tomorrow, and there's a war on, and the economy is in trouble - the show must go on) and it will be framed in a predictable way - there may have, perhaps, at times been a perceived lack of due diligence in vetting the military experts, but these analysts were "expected to keep the network informed about any outside business entanglements," as one ABC spokesman put it. Right. I forgot. The onus is on the mob hit man to disclose his affiliations when speaking about the innocence of crime bosses.

The media has blood on its hands. The media was spoon-fed bullshit and ate it up and shit it out and then the consuming public ate it up, and the very machine that spoon-fed the bullshit then used the re-constituted bullshit to say, "analysts on (insert news corp here) today said the war is going fine." And then the media served this up to us again. An enormous feedback loop serving no one but the people feeding the bullshit machine. Not a conspiracy - conspiracies are not sustainable because they rely on secrecy and secrets eventually leak out. What is sustainable is people looking out for their own selfish interests and, in light of those interests, failing to speak truthfully, failing to, as Whitehead says, "forge every sentence in the teeth of irreducible and stubborn facts."

The problem isn't that the Pentagon was (and is) running a propaganda machine. The problem is that it has worked so well for so long. And it only works because people are complicit, whether through puppetry, parroting, or silence. The hope, of course, would be that this type of story will cause people to reflect on the sources and purposes of information and that the next time we will pay attention. Of course, the trick is to recognize that the "next time" is now, that there is no time like the present to begin practicing attentiveness.

Elitism

2008-04-17T13:31:00.005-05:00

I've been trying to figure out how to respond to the elitism debate (and I'm not talking about last night's debate in which it took 46 minutes to get to an issue besides elitism, Jeremiah Wright, the Weather Underground, and flag lapel pins). I think Jon Stewart's is the best analysis I've seen so far. (see video below) People don't cling to guns, religion, racism, and anti-immigration sentiment because of their economic circumstances - these are traditions that are passed down from generation to generation. This isn't 'bitterness,' it's a way of life.

Perhaps this will all blow over, or perhaps like John Kerry windsurfing this will be part of the downfall of an intelligent and capable leader. God forbid our president be smarter than us! I'm with Stewart on this one too - "Not only do I want an elite president, I want someone who's embarrassingly superior to me." As he asks the candidates, "If you don't actually think you're better than us, then what the fuck are you doing?"

The problem with what Obama said is that it's the obverse side of what his campaign has been all about - unity. The reason Obama's message resonates is because we are a country divided along many lines. Those divisions are tribalistic in nature - this is not an American trait, it's a human one. We have circles of compassion and the more distant you are from my circle, the less compassion I have for you. Obama's campaign is premised on his (genuine, I think) frustration with the divisions in the country. His speech at the Democratic convention, the one that thrust him into rock star stauts, was about how we need to begin looking at what brings us together rather than those things that keep us separate from our fellow Americans and fellow humans. A call to unity is premised on a thesis of divisions, deep divisions. Obama's mistakes were: 1) he singled out small town people for critique - the same types of bigotry and anti-outsider sentiments exist in every city, neighborhood, suburb. Of course those sentiments are aimed at different 'Others,' but every community has its Other; 2) he floated some theory of economic causation where economics is just another line of division - the class line - which Americans are loathe to discuss (when asked in polls, very few Americans consider themselves 'poor,' even those who are); and 3) he apparently didn't frame the comment in the context of Hope and Unity. In other words, he did let slip the 'mask' as Kristol said in his column, though Kristol misidentified the mask. I don't believe Obama is disdainful of small town America, I think he is deeply disturbed by the divisions in the country as a whole, that the feelings of frustration he has about these divisions and the ways they impede solutions to the real problems real people are suffering motivate him as a public servant, and he was speaking in a specific context - raising money for a specific race, the PA primary - and forgot to make sure he included the laundry list of ways in which all Americans are guilty of provincialism and tribalism.

This is not the 'true' face of an elitist closet Marxist, it is an unfortunate misstep that I hope will not cost him the nomination. But if it does... we as Americans do not have the sophistication that Obama continually credits us with to be able to tell the difference between real issues and hype. Anyone who watched the debate last night couldn't help but recognize how press-driven these manufactured issues are - Hillary exaggerating the threat when she landed in Bosnia, Obama not wearing a flag lapel pin, Wright, the Weather Underground? For chrissakes, is this really how we'll decide who the nominee should be?

Father of Chaos Dies

2008-04-17T13:06:00.005-05:00

A butterfly somewhere decided it was time for Edward Lorenz to leave us. His influence and work live on.

Vogue: the Race Issue

2008-04-10T11:37:00.004-05:00

Vogue's Shape Issue has become the Race Issue. I hadn't heard about this story until this morning when Chicago public radio's 848 broadcast a commentary by Jessica Young about the cover. I immediately wanted to respond to that commentary (I'll get to it), but when I got home and started looking around on the internets I realized that there was a national murmur going on about this Vogue cover. I don't know where, but somewhere in the blogosphere somebody started talking about how the Vogue magazine cover was strikingly similar to the poster for the 1933 film, King Kong.

Granted, I know nothing about sports and even less about fashion, so maybe I'm just ignorant, but I do believe I am fairly media literate and have a broad vocabulary when it comes to images. I have to say - I don't see anything inherently racist about this image. It seems to be a picture of a basketball player doing what basketball players do - look intimidating and powerful while dribbling a ball - paired with an image of a fashion model doing what fashion models do - look glamorous in that unattainably beautiful fashion model way.

On one level, it's just another image saturating my walk through the checkout line. If I personally was to object to anything it'd be the idea that somehow this is what I should want - to be Vogue, to be a superstar, or at least that this is what I should be paying attention to - fame, fortune, glamor - but then that's my quasi-Marxist lens, as limited as the racism-is-everywhere lens.

On another level, and I think because Annie Leibovitz is such a great photographer, it is an image that strikes lots of chords - sexual, emotional, and yes, deep down under all of it, I guess I have to admit, racial. I don't know. As I write this I begin to sigh and let my shoulders fall in resignation to those who would make this image about race. How can it not be about race? It's an image in a line of images connected to a particular place and time, that place and time being America, a country that has been and is racialized and, for much of its history, racist. The image has a genealogy, conscious and unconscious, which perhaps includes the King Kong poster, perhaps it doesn't. Does the image take meaning from the photographer behind the lens or the lens in front of the audience? Clearly both. I know all these things- as a student of literature I have been schooled in and enjoy the art of deconstruction. But something about this debate bothers me, and I'm having trouble pinpointing it. I think the problem is that the conversation participates and legitimizes narratives of victimization and racism in its own peculiar way.

In this narrative, LeBron James is an ignorant black man who has succumb to the larger white culture and allowed himself (and thereby all black men) to be stereotyped as a gorilla, a savage. LeBron James is a victim in this scenario. A victim or a sellout, and the two are interrelated. He is a victim because he has sold out. This I don't buy, for two reasons. First, LeBron James is supposedly famously concerned with his image and he himself has dismissed the hoopla, saying he was just "having fun." Of course, many will respond that he, like a long list of other black men, is not conscious of what his image communicates or has limited capacity to understand the implications of his behavior. And perhaps these people are right: he has been labeled as a man without a social conscience for not signing a letter from the Cavaliers condemning Chinese support of genocide in Darfur. But the more compelling reason to not buy into this narrative is that it is the mirror image of the backhanded (and ultimately racist) comment one can imagine Archie Bunker saying, "He's a credit to his race." The notion that one black person stands in for all black people is as absurd from the perspective of a race-conscious person as it is from the perspective of a racist. LeBron James is LeBron James on this cover, he is not Black Masculinity. Now, the obvious counterargument is that Vogue did in fact make a big deal about the fact that this was the first black man ever (and only the third man) to be on the cover of Vogue. But does that mean that Richard Gere and George Clooney are not merely themselves but White Masculinity or, even more absurd, Masculinity itself? If so, this gets back to my initial critique of the cover which is - why do we grant Vogue the power to tell us who we are or who we should want to be?

Returning to the source of my consternation, Jessica Young's commentary on 848 this morning took another tack. She asserted that what bothered her about the cover is that it was yet another rich famous black man eschewing women of his own race for a beautiful white woman, thereby alienating her, a black woman, because it "venerates a standard of beauty which [she], as a black woman, will never possess." This is, perhaps, the most bizarre response I have come across. First, it seems to suggest that if LeBron James were posed with a black supermodel, this would be a less alienating standard of beauty, as though it is Gisele's skin color that makes her brand of beauty unattainable to the average woman. And this is a "brand of beauty" - it is an image for sale, a perfection out of reach but toward which we are always to strive. Second, this critique appropriates a discourse of anti-miscegenation that can hardly be said to have a positive history in this country.

Perhaps my response is more about the power we grant to commercial images in our society. We, as the consummate consumers, allow simulations to stand in for reality and expect our corporations (and our superstars) to bear the burden of and light the way toward our collective aspirations. As if what is on the cover of Vogue magazine, or any other advertisement, is (or should be) the best of what America should strive for. It is symptomatic of a larger expectation that the market can save us. In the end, the market ends up co-opting and ultimately trivializing even the most serious discussions we as Americans should be having. A call for a conversation on race morphs into a conversation about a basketball player and a supermodel on the cover of a magazine whose sole purpose is to sell more images to us, more superficiality.

I think in the end even this blog post participates in a conversation that is ultimately superficial. The real questions we need to be asking ourselves are not as easily digestable as the images on the cover of Vogue magazine. The images we need to be looking at and discussing are much less glamorous - the faces of poverty and suffering in this country and throughout the world. And the questions of race and class spurred by those images are much less heady, and require much more of us. There are very real problems on the other side of the war photographer's lens, for instance, that require pragmatic thinking and doing. That work is much less comfortable. We must imagine ourselves as an Other who none of us would wish to be. Much easier to indulge in the fantasy that we are LeBron James and Gisele Bundchen and that they are us. Much easier, and much less relevant.

Justice v. Profit

2008-04-07T13:01:00.003-05:00

The New York Times ran an article yesterday on cases involving pharmaceutical companies that are making their way through the Federal courts. The drug makers are basically arguing that approval by the FDA pre-empts plaintiffs' rights to sue in state court. Since there is no Federal tort law, this means that individuals injured by drugs will have no recourse against drug makers if they are injured or killed by the drugs they are taking. The fact that these companies are making this argument is apalling enough, but the fact that this argument is succeeding is the real kick in the teeth.

The Supreme Court has become business's best friend. I won't go into all the details, since others have written more articulately on it already (See Supreme Court Inc. in New York Times magazine from a couple weeks ago), but these medical cases seem to highlight the way in which the judiciary has become the third and final branch of our government to be beholden to corporate interests.

The Supreme Court already decided for the makers of medical devices in a similar case in February. (Supreme Court Shields Medical-Device Makers) In that case, a man was severely injured and then killed by a catheter balloon that exploded in his heart, and his estate sued the manufacturer. In an opinion consistent with his wont to increase executive power, Scalia argued that since the catheter underwent FDA approval, the individual had no right to sue under state law. This means if the FDA doesn't go after a manufacturer for misrepresenting (lying about?) their product, as in the case of the birth control patch discussed in yesterday's NYT article, the manufacturer will never be held accountable. So we can expect our drugs and medical devices to be only as safe as the current administration thinks they should be. For example, under Bush we've been given an administration that believes government cannot do a good job at anything and has done its best to practice what it preaches.

People can rage all they want about how litigious we've become and the outrageous awards in plaintiffs' lawsuits, but the truth is the courts are an important tool in curbing individual and corporate malfeasance. Yes, there are a certain number of frivolous lawsuits, but if the Economic Policy Institute (an admittedly center left organization begun by, among others, Robert Reich) is to be believed, tort litigation is not nearly as all-powerful an enemy as Bush, et al. would have us believe. Our form of government relies on a system of checks and balances, a back and forth that, theoretically, arrives at a win-win (or, if you prefer, lose-lose) solution for us, the governed. Increasingly, however, government for the people by the people has become government for the corporations by the corporations. The built in system of checks and balances cannot work when all the players are on one team.

I don't know what the solution is. The Left has all but given up on challenging the inevitability and naturalization of capitalism. Corporations are people too, under the law, so maybe government for the corporations by the corporations is just the winning out of one group's interests over another's. But I think the intimate relationship between power and money is one way in which America, for all its promise, has not gotten out from under the power imbalances of the past. Corporations seem to have no taxation and representation, while the rest of us remain taxed and unrepresented. I acknowledge the hyperbole of that statement, but the dominance of corporate interests over those of the average citizen is problematic for democracy and we the (real) people seem to be losing ground every day.

Why Hillary should not bow out.

2008-04-03T12:15:00.003-05:00

I am going to do something that very few people admit to. I am going to change my mind. Watch out - here it comes!

Maureen Dowd suggested in her column yesterday that Hillary's continued presence in the race makes Obama a stronger general election candidate because he gets to sharpen his teeth on her. Although I think Dowd does participate in the sexism everyone accuses the media of in her column (casting Hillary as a woman "worried about her fleeting youth and the fickleness of men"), I think she may have a point. And it helped me to clarify something I have already been thinking - that Hillary should definitely not bow out of this race.

In my March 9 post I suggested that Hillary's remaining in this race will weaken Obama's candidacy because she is doing McCain's job for him. This is the opposite of what Dowd has said, and as I said, she may be right. (that's a piece of the change of mind I spoke of earlier) But there is an even more important way in which Hillary's remaining in the race will strengthen Obama's campaign - it allows all the people in all the states to have their say about who the nominee will be. And at the end of the day, if Obama has received more pledged delegates and has won the popular vote, there is little to recommend the superdelegates support Hillary as the nominee. And after a few weeks of moaning, hopefully a majority of Hillary supporters would come together with Obama's supporters as Democrats to defeat McCain in the general election. This is the only democratic way to do things. Those who are calling for her to leave the race now are misguided - if the Hillary supporters in the remaining states don't even have the chance to cast their miracle-begging votes, they will feel disenfranchised and may abandon Obama in November, something we cannot risk. So while I roll my eyes every time I hear Hillary proclaim that she is staying in this race to protect the sanctity of democracy, the truth is her remaining in the race until all the states have had their primaries will, I beleive, strengthen an eventual Obama candidacy by virtue of that candidacy being arrived at democratically.

However, I think Howard Dean's call for the race to be decided by July 1 is the proper course. At that point, I think all superdelegates should feel obliged to support whichever candidate has the most pledged delegates and the greatest popular vote. To continue bickering about whether Obama should be the candidate into August is just a waste of time and money, and if Hillary were to receive the nomination via a brokered convention, God help the Democratic party. And maybe he would - after all, miracles do happen, or so I'm told.

Judas!

2008-03-22T14:48:00.002-05:00

Just when you think Clinton and her closest advisers can't get any more hyperbolic or self-aggrandizing, James Carville speaks: “Mr. Richardson’s endorsement [of Obama] came right around the anniversary of the day when Judas sold out for 30 pieces of silver, so I think the timing is appropriate, if ironic."

Which of the Clintons is Christ in this analogy? I like to think that Carville is embracing a radical feminist theology.

On the other hand, if Bill is Jesus, the role of Mary Magdelene is so predictably cast.

And how does Obama fit in? I'm not as biblically literate as I should be: who is it that Judas endorses? Satan? Or, paraphrasing Dylan, did Judas Iscariot have God on his side?

Or perhaps James Carville is merely suggesting, as other serious thinkers on the internets have, that Obama is the Antichrist.

In the end, I think this simply betrays the ultimate martyr complex that lies just below the surface in the mind of Clinton and all her supporters. If someone doesn't support her it must be because they're evil and misguided, not simply because they disagree.

Trinity United Church of Christ

2008-03-21T11:50:00.005-05:00

The internet and cable TV have been awash with images of Jeremiah Wright, Barack Obama's former pastor, saying "God damn America!" and "America's chickens are coming home to roost." I will withhold comment on these statements - more than enough has been made of them. What I do want to say is the one time that I, a non-religious white man, attended Trinity United Church of Christ I was received warmly by the members of the congregation, and I was extremely moved by the service and the powerful sense of community that permeated the space.

My mother and stepfather are UCC members and make a point of attending Trinity (the country's largest UCC congregation) when they are in Chicago to visit my brother and me. I joined them a couple years ago on Father's Day. I was late getting there, of course, and when I walked in the lobby there were just a few people waiting to get in to the sanctuary - latecomers like me. A woman walked up to me and said, "Good morning. You must be looking for your mother. They're already inside - you'll have to wait to go in until there's a break in the service." I thanked her and thought, how did she know I was looking for my mother? And immediately laughed to myself. How many other young white men would be coming in this morning?

Rev. Wright gave a thoughtful and empowering sermon about fatherhood and the importance of honoring fathers in the black community and the responsibilities that fatherhood entails. The choir was amazing and nothing like what we had in the Lutheran churches I grew up attending. And when we 'passed the peace,' I was warmly greeted by those in the pews in front and behind me and when I somewhat shyly extended my hand to shake the hand of the middle-aged woman next to me I was very touched when she waved that off and gave me a big hug.

Whatever Rev. Wright's political views, there is no doubt in my mind that the congregation at Trinity is one that welcomes all people and practices the love that is so central to Christ's message. I wonder how much those messages will be played and replayed on CNN and Fox News.

Framing the Debate

2008-03-20T12:03:00.005-05:00

"As the Iraqi security forces stand up, coalition forces can stand down." President Bush

"We have given them the precious gift of freedom and it is up to them to decide whether or not they will use it." Hillary Clinton

"The best way to protect our security and to pressure Iraq's leaders to resolve their civil war is to immediately begin to remove our combat troops" Barack Obama

"Americans are rightly concerned about how much longer our nation must continue to sacrifice for an Iraqi government that is unwilling or unable to secure its own future." Nancy Pelosi

I have been disappointed of late to realize what a good job the Neocons and Republicans have done at framing the debate around the war in Iraq. President Bush began in 2005 with his "stand up/stand down" explanation of how America will extricate itself from Iraq. Essentially, leading Democrats have flipped this on it's head without questioning the underlying assumption. Democrats have basically adopted a "stand down/stand up" approach - as we begin withdrawing our troops this will force the Iraqi government to take control and a country divided will become a country united.

On one level, this is correct: there is no question that as we begin to stand down, Iraqis will begin to stand up - with guns in hand. Hillary Clinton characterized our presence as babysitting a civil war. What she doesn't acknowledge, what none of the Democrats seem to acknowledge, is that America created this mess and America cannot simply wash its hands of it because it's no longer politically popular. To withdraw in the hopes that democracy will magically take hold is as fantastical as the Neocons' hopes that invading Iraq would bring democracy to the middle east.

I acknowledge that I am no expert, but it seems to me that whatever success has occurred in Kosovo (and that is an open question), it is because it was NATO-led and UN administered. It surprises me that Obama, who continually talks about improving our image around the world, doesn't talk more about reaching out to our allies to help build a stable Iraq. To be fair, Obama repeatedly says we must be "as careful getting out as we were careless getting in." But why not elaborate on that? Why not come forward with some type of plan? Distinguish himself from the pack? For that matter, it surprises me that Hillary doesn't come out with a Kosovo-type proposal for Iraq. Isn't that one of the great successes of the Clinton presidency?

I often say that there must be people who are much more intelligent than me thinking about these problems. I hope some of them will start to speak up. Because, whether they want to acknowledge it or not, Democrats seem to have bought into the Neocon myth that there is a relationship between military action and the creation of stable governments. The Democrats keep saying there is no military solution to this problem; unfortunately they fail to see that they too are embracing a military solution. Who will stand up for intelligent international diplomatic intervention paired with massive aid?

"Your dreams...

2008-03-18T11:37:00.004-05:00

... do not have to come at the expense of my dreams."

I'm guessing Barack is not speaking to Hillary when he says those words, but the message of his speech today was still very strong: America is not post-racial, and there are still very many real divisions, but we have an opportunity to move forward.

Barack demonstrates yet again what it is that draws his supporters to him - a core belief in the ability of Americans to see beyond divisions and to focus energy on the points at which our interests merge.