I'm referring to the Minutemen, who are stepping up their patrols of the US-Mexico border. To me, this sounds like a great idea. I'm in favor of significantly relaxing immigration policy, but I'm also in favor of rigorously enforcing immigration law. We can't regulate and protect the use of immigrant labor if the laborors in question have no legal status. Immigration has been one of the things that has gotten the US to where it is, but illegal immigration isn't helping anyone.
...just how beleaguered the GOP gets. There's certainly grist for the Dems mill to grind, but it doesn't look like they're in any position to generate any traction.
Money quote: "Name the four things the Democrats stand for. Go!"
I certainly couldn't.
The downside of working here is that I'm now listening to a muzak rendition of "For the Longest Time", a song with which I was never particularly taken. And if I hear their version of "Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head" ...well, I guess that just means I came back to work tomorrow.
There is an upshot to working 60 hours a week. I've found that I basically wind up turning off certain parts of my brain that I would honestly rather not deal with at the moment. Certain people can forgive, but never forget. I'm finding that I have a harder time with forgiveness, but sometimes, just sometimes, I can forget. And there's nothing like a 15 hour workday to help with that.
Knob Creek doesn't hurt either.
Great. The 2nd season of Battlestar Galactica ended on Friday, and damn, this cliffhanger is just as big as the last one. These people can tell a really good story. The series made #2 on a recent "Top Sci-Fi Shows of All Time" list, and it deserved it, if it isn't actually the finest such show in existence.
But now the 2nd season is over, and though a third has been annouced, I can't find any reference to a date when it might start airing. Frustrating beyond belief.
Because I'm bored, and I'm standing in front of an Internet-capable PC all day. I mean, sure, I check in and keep track of guests, but mostly I get to stand around. So... we blog. Can't really read a book, as it's not allowed at the front desk, though I'll have to see Project Gutenberg.
Basically, I'll be blogging a lot more than I did over the summer because, face it: what else have I got to do?
Christopher Hitchens is my hero. He's got a fantastic takedown of the "anti-war" protests going on in DC right now. The organizers behind the rallies? Self-proclaimed Stalinists, jihadists, Baathists, and defenders of the perpetrators of the Rwandan genocide. "Anti-war"? As Hitchens puts it, "It is really a disgrace that the liberal press refers to such enemies of liberalism as 'antiwar' when in reality they are straight-out pro-war, but on the other side."
You shouldn't take it so personal
I didn't mean to make you so sad
You just happened to be there, that's all
When I saw you say "goodbye" to your friends and smile
I thought that it was well understood
That you'd be comin' back in a little while
I didn't know that you were sayin' "goodbye" for good
But, sooner or later, one of us must know
You just did what you're supposed to do
Sooner or later, one of us must know
That I really did try to get close to you
I couldn't see what you could show me
Your scarf had kept your mouth well hid
I couldn't see how you could know me
But you said you knew me and I believed you did
When you whispered in my ear
And asked me if I was leavin' with you or her
I didn't realize just what I did hear
I didn't realize how young you were
But, sooner or later, one of us must know
You just did what you're supposed to do
Sooner or later, one of us must know
That I really did try to get close to you
I couldn't see when it started snowin'
Your voice was all that I heard
I couldn't see where we were goin'
But you said you knew an' I took your word
And then you told me later, as I apologized
That you were just kiddin' me, you weren't really from the farm
An' I told you, as you clawed out my eyes
That I never really meant to do you any harm
But, sooner or later, one of us must know
You just did what you're supposed to do
Sooner or later, one of us must know
That I really did try to get close to you
This from a pretty unrelated book review in October's Atlantic, to which I can't link as it's subscription only. But the quote is as follows:
"We frequently attribute greater goodness to people we consider less complex or sophisticated than the norm. It's how we compensate them for our essential condescension."
Apply that to the working poor, the entire Arab world, and most of the Third World, and I think we can pretty much explain the motives of the better part of the contemporary Left.
...they're planting stories in the press
Whoever it is I wish they'd cut it out but when they will I can only guess.
They say I shot a man named Gray and took his wife to Italy,
She inherited a million bucks and when she died it came to me.
I can't help it if I'm lucky.
People see me all the time and they just can't remember how to act
Their minds are filled with big ideas, images and distorted facts.
Even you, yesterday you had to ask me where it was at,
I couldn't believe after all these years, you didn't know me better than that
Sweet lady.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your mouth,
Blowing down the backroads headin' south.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth,
You're an idiot, babe.
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.
I ran into the fortune-teller, who said beware of lightning that might strike
I haven't known peace and quiet for so long I can't remember what it's like.
There's a lone soldier on the cross, smoke pourin' out of a boxcar door,
You didn't know it, you didn't think it could be done, in the final end he won the wars
After losin' every battle.
I woke up on the roadside, daydreamin' 'bout the way things sometimes are
Visions of your chestnut mare shoot through my head and are makin' me see stars.
You hurt the ones that I love best and cover up the truth with lies.
One day you'll be in the ditch, flies buzzin' around your eyes,
Blood on your saddle.
Idiot wind, blowing through the flowers on your tomb,
Blowing through the curtains in your room.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth,
You're an idiot, babe.
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.
It was gravity which pulled us down and destiny which broke us apart
You tamed the lion in my cage but it just wasn't enough to change my heart.
Now everything's a little upside down, as a matter of fact the wheels have stopped,
What's good is bad, what's bad is good, you'll find out when you reach the top
You're on the bottom.
I noticed at the ceremony, your corrupt ways had finally made you blind
I can't remember your face anymore, your mouth has changed, your eyes
don't look into mine.
The priest wore black on the seventh day and sat stone-faced while the building
burned.
I waited for you on the running boards, near the cypress trees, while the springtime
turned Slowly into autumn.
Idiot wind, blowing like a circle around my skull,
From the Grand Coulee Dam to the Capitol.
Idiot wind, blowing every time you move your teeth,
You're an idiot, babe.
It's a wonder that you still know how to breathe.
I can't feel you anymore, I can't even touch the books you've read
Every time I crawl past your door, I been wishin' I was somebody else instead.
Down the highway, down the tracks, down the road to ecstasy,
I followed you beneath the stars, hounded by your memory
And all your ragin' glory.
I been double-crossed now for the very last time and now I'm finally free,
I kissed goodbye the howling beast on the borderline which separated you from me.
You'll never know the hurt I suffered nor the pain I rise above,
And I'll never know the same about you, your holiness or your kind of love,
And it makes me feel so sorry.
Idiot wind, blowing through the buttons of our coats,
Blowing through the letters that we wrote.
Idiot wind, blowing through the dust upon our shelves,
We're idiots, babe.
It's a wonder we can even feed ourselves.
---
No, I didn't write that.
There's an interesting Slate article discussing the fact that while China has us basically beat in the manufacturing sector (it's hard to justify paying more than you have to for essentially unskilled labor), we've still got decades on them in the sales, marketing, advertising, and financial sectors.
There are plenty of things Americans can do which will create great growth and stem the "flow" of jobs to other countries, it's just that they all require a certain amount of education, discipline, organization, motivation, and responsibility. There isn't any reason why the outflow of manufacturing jobs should hurt us at all: we should be poised to take over their middle and upper management structures. But for some reason we aren't, for reasons I've discussed earlier this month.
I've been reading through and teaching the Epic of Gilgamesh with the 7th graders at CCA, and it's had me spending a lot of time in the Old Testament. In many ways, it's the typification of the worldview of those not belonging to the covenant: the glorification of man and his greatness, and the desire to "make a name" for ourselves.
As I've been studying, things I've been reading started connecting with other, previously unrelated trains of thought. I have the following question: does Scripture actually teach that all sexual activity outside of marriage constitutes adultery? Or, more broadly, is any kind of sexual activity aside from normal marital relations automatically immoral?
The standard Sunday school answer is a resounding "Yes", but somehow I wonder.
Before anyone asks, this isn't an attempt to justify any behavior on my part. I've got none to apologize for no matter how you slice it. But as I look on our culture, especially our Christian culture, which is entirely obsessed with sexuality and deeply hypocritical about it, part of me wonders if the restraints placed upon sexual activity are entirely sane.
The commentary in Scripture on the laws indicates that if a married person has an extra-marital affair, they are generally to be killed except in the case of rape, wherein the victim is held guiltless. But for people who are not married, it doesn't seem to be as big a deal. The key passage seems to be Exodus 22:16, which isn't even part of the long list of sexual no-nos. Those lists seem to be pretty non-negotiable, and seem to refer back to uses of sexuality that are entirely beyond the pale: extra-marital affairs, bestiality, incest, and homosexuality (come on, it's in there, at least in Levitucus). But for general purpose "normal" sexuality, there doesn't seem to be much commentary.
Let's look at the punishments for sexual immorality. For married people, it's pretty much the death penalty, full stop. For the above list, it's also death. But for non-married people engaging in "normal" sexual activity? Well, if a man seduces a virgin, he has to compensate her father for the loss of income he'd experience as his daughter is now "damaged goods", but there isn't any comment on that. The verse, Ex. 22:16 is in a passage of Scripture detailing protections for the poor and other social justice concerns, not in a discussion of sexuality.
Am I missing something here? Oh, that's right, the Sermon on the Mount. But wait. The word is, again, "adultery", and the intention seems to be that the heart's intentions are at least as significant than the outward action. If non-prohibited sexual activity among non-married people isn't wrong, the injunction doesn't apply. Paul's reference to "not even a hint of sexual immorality"? Again, if it isn't immoral, he's not talking about that.
If the intent of the commandment is the preservation of marriage vows and the integrity of the family as the basic unit of human society, that's one thing, but it doesn't necessarily have to be the blanket sexual prohibition that it's generally understood to be.
In a related train of thought, Josiah recently had a post on polygamy, where it's pointed out that the patriarchs and Judean kings had multiple wives yet were not reprimanded for it. I don't think it follows from there that we're to embrace polygamy, but it is worth noting that God thought Bathsheeba was a huge deal (taking another man's wife and killing him to cover up for it), but having lots of wives wasn't. And the argument that God was just making allowance for ancient cultural practices is bogus: God entirely reshaped Jewish culture from the ground up and has never had much respect for purely human institutions. When he wants something to be different, he says so. Obviously, polygamy isn't a violation of the commandment against adultery, yet the commandment is still used as an argument against it. If that's an improper application, might other common applications also be wrong?
Thoughts?
It turns out that John Lennon was indeed monitored by the FBI as a suspected communist/rabble-rouser, but that his involvement with serious political operatores was ruled out... because he was too stoned.
Money quote: "[Lennon] appears to be radically orientated, [but] does not give the impression he is a true revolutionist, since he is constantly under the influence of narcotics."
It was true then, and it's true now.
/begin egregious flame
HamDems, take notice, because whatever you're smoking, it must be the good stuff. If you're wondering why you never seem to be able to win...
/end flame
I'm currently listening to the muzak version of "Stairway to Heaven" while standing at the desk. The end is most certainly near.
As I'm now working upwards of 60 hours a week, I'd like to make it known that the best way of getting in touch with me is no longer the phone, but email. My normal day goes something like this:
6:30, get up
7:40, be at school
8:10-10:50, teach
10:50-12:30, grade homework, etc.
12:30-2:30, eat and work out
2:30-11:00, work
That doesn't leave a lot of time to hang out or talk to people, but as I only teach M-F and only work evenings 4-5 days a week, there will be mornings and evenings where I am available. So shoot me an email, and we can work something out.
Not that there's anyone out there just dying to get in touch, but still... one must at least pretend.
Cindy Sheehan has sunk to new depths of complete insanity. Now she wants the US to remove its troops from "occupied New Orleans.
I'm just going to sit here and sputter for a few minutes until I can formulate some kind of coherent response.
WHAT!?
She wants us to take troops AWAY from the city which the entire moonbat coalition complained didn't have enough Federal presence? Is she completely insane?
Stupid question.
This woman is completely and totally certifiable. She's pretty consistent in her rabid hatred for George Bush, but in doing so she's sacrificed any shred of decency, sanity, rationality, responsibility, and dignity that she may have once possessed. Somebody get this women some lithium and thorazine, and quick. I'm not sure the fabric of reality can deal with this growing singularity of psychosis.
A federal judge in - where else? - California has ruled that reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in school is unconstitutional.
Now taking bets as to how fast that one'll get struck down...
A Catholic high school in PA has come up with an utterly terrifying and Constitutionally dubious way of meeting their fundraising goals: play "MMMBop" by Hanson before classes, between classes, and during lunch, until $3000 is collected for the Katrina relief effort.
Oh. My.
Flee. Flee in terror.
One week moves to the next. Just finished my first week teaching. It's been good. Took me a few days to figure out how to reach the 7th graders, but I think I've got the hang of it: Friday had some really good discussion and interaction, and I think I know how and why.
I started training at the hotel yesterday. I go back tomorrow to receive formal orientation and continue learning the computer system. Shouldn't take more than another day or two, but it's annoying. Once I finish, I'll be working from about 7:30AM to 11:00PM with about three hours off in the middle. I'll be working more than 11 hours a day, all told.
Right now I'm listening to the new Killers album, "Hot Fuss". It's pretty fun, and the three tracks on the limited edition are quite good. Think Franz Ferdinand but more soulful lyrics (Franz never seems to get above hooking up with people at clubs) and a slightly smoother sound.
I've just about had it with women, but last night I found a great dive bar (it's actually the building in the middle of the parking lot just west of the indicator) about a mile from my house, so I guess it evens out. The good news is that the whiskey works. I'm becoming increasingly partial to both single malt scotch and Knob Creek bourbon.
Some moonbat has decided that it's time to launch an Internet-based campaign to impeach the president.
Time for a lesson in Constitutional law:
"The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors."
-- US Constitution, Article II, section iv.
You can't be impeached for being incompetent. You've got to break the law first. Get a clue.
As an aside, the idea that a collection of echo-chamber bloggers can unseat a sitting head-of-state has to qualify as one of the most acute cases of delusions of grandeur to date.
I know I'm probably damning myself to a flood of mob comments, but I think it needs to be said:
"Say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, at least it's an ethos."
I'll take tyrrany over anarchy any day.
Done now. Bed time.
First off, check the discussion and my comments over at bob's blog.
I think it's time we stopped complaining about the lack of good jobs in this country. There are plenty of good jobs. Companies are always hiring professionals: if you've got a nursing degree, there are over 100 positions available to you in the Hershey Medical Center alone. You can basically name your own department, hours, and schedule, they're so desperate.
But not everyone has the discipline to go to college and get their nursing degree. Not everyone even has the discipline to go to a two or three year nursing certification program. But don't start complaining yet: there's also a need for skilled laborers: concrete finishers, electricians, carpenters, mechanics, plumbers, forklift operators, teamsters, computer technicians, roofers, etc. None of these take all that much training. No academic prowess or special level of intelligence is required. So why does the city of New York have to put up posters advertising for bus mechanics and police officers? Because there aren't enough qualified applicants.
Why not? Because we're sending all of our kids through a quasi-academic high school program that leaves most of them with a useless diploma they didn't earn while not preparing them on any level for professional careers. Something like 25% of Americans will go to college. Why should the other 75% have to spend the best opportunity they will ever have to learn vocational skills preparing for a future they will never attain? I think this is something the Europeans have right: if you aren't headed to college, you shouldn't go to high school, you should go to vocational training. Most Americans, I would argue, could use a lot less education and a lot more training. So what if they've read Great Expectations? Does that help them get a job more than a month spent learning to weld?
The blue-collar worker should be the least susceptible to offshoring, not the most. Think about it. Where do you need to be to write computer code? Any place that has power and access to the Internet. Why not India? But where do you need to be to install an electrical outlet? Wherever the building in question is located. Same goes for repair and construction work: it's inherently un-offshore-able. Manufacturing is lauded as the ultimate blue-collar job, but I think that has at least as much to do with the fact that the labor is, as a rule, totally unskilled, so any schmuck can do it. But can anyone repair a bus? No, that takes a certain level of training.
There's a reason that children of college-educated parents are much more likely to go to college than children of blue-collar parents, and it has far less to do with income or education than with upbringing and culture. Stick two kids from the same town into the same public school and the child of college-educated parents is more likely to get an education than his blue-collar counterpart.
I think the problem is that we've got too many opportunities, not too few. I say we abolish the inner-city public high schools and send the kids to arc-welding school. The best they can hope for is a decent, skilled-labor job, so why not just train them to hold it down? Maybe their kids will get a clue and have the aptitude for college, and maybe they won't, but they won't be poverty-stricken.
Death to high school!
A previously unknown "company" known as "AtomChip" is announcing a 6.8GHz, 2TB laptop. It's "quantum-optical". And, as far as I can tell, utterly illusory.
A columnist with the Washington Times is suggesting that the moonbats aren't getting the traction they've hoped for in their anti-Bush tirade. I hope he's right; it's hard to hear in the echo-chamber that is the net.
I started teaching today. I had both lit classes, and will start math tomorrow. They're great kids. This is gonna be fun.
I also accepted a job offer at the Hilton Garden Inn in Hershey/Hummelstown. I go over tomorrow to finalize details and work out my schedule, etc. It's a 2nd shift job, from 2:30-11:00PM. The wage isn't terrific, but it's got good benefits, and I can stay at any hotel owned by Hilton - Hilton, Hilton Garden Inn, Hampton Inn, etc. - for $39.99 a night. Which isn't bad. We're going to be road-tripping a bit this year, if I can find people with whom to split gas costs.
So it's a good day.
My family life at the moment can be easily summerized by the movie Spanglish, provided one excises the affair, the mother-in-law, and the housekeeper.
Those interested in more details may contact me directly.
It seems that Shell has developed an economical means for extracting oil from the world's largest deposits, i.e. the oil shale fields in Colorodo.
Up to now, it has taken more energy to extract the oil from the rock than the process produced. But with oil at $70 a barrel and with Shell's new procedure, it looks like we're sitting on about a trillion barrels of economical fuel. That's four times the estimated reserve of Saudi Arabia.
Sweet.
Let's step back for a minute. A lot of noise has been generated - some by me - criticizing the the Federal government in general and the Bush administration in particular for their response to hurricane Katrina. I'm starting to wonder if this is justified.
First off, we're facing one of the worst natural disasters in our nation's history, and possibly the world. Last year's tsunami was terrible, but in a sense it was a lot easier to deal with: the water came, and the water went, and that was kind of that. No major economic infrastructure was destroyed as far as I can tell (the destruction of fishing boats is a personal tragedy, but doesn't interfere with economies on a wider scale), and there wasn't standing water much of anywhere. The disaster took a grand total of a few hours from start to finish, and once it was over there wasn't any real reason to evacuate anyone. There were hundreds of thousands of fatalities, but it was a once and done deal. Yes, there continue to be problems and displacements, and it will take some time for the region to fully recover, but essentially, the damage was acute, not chronic. There are no major population centers that remain uninhabitable.
New Orleans is entirely different. The breaking of the levees introduced a chronic problem, and as the song says, when the levee breaks you have no place to stay. The water needs to be removed, as it won't go away on its own. New Orleans wasn't just damaged or destroyed, it was actually drowned. This is a disaster on a whole new level, and one which creates long-term, entrenched problems. When teh tsunami hit, some people were relocated, but not many and not for very long. In New Orleans, hundreds of thousands of people aren't dead, but they do need new homes. Though we're all happy they survived, dead people are easier to deal with than live ones.
Secondly, what, exactly, are we griping about in terms of slow response? The only way we could have had troops and supplies in New Orleans in the first few days after the hurricane is if we had had them standing by, ready to deploy at a moment's notice. This is a hideously expensive proposition, and one that no one seems to be willing to endorse. And about the issue of reinforcing the levees: everyone knew it was a potential danger. Come on, they're able to look up at the water line. That can't be good for morale. But if the state or government had tried to spend money on reinforcing them, do you think it would have happened? Heck no: people would have cried foul that the government is "wasting" millions of dollars on levees that are holding just fine, thank you. Of course the engineers recommend they be strengthened: that's what engineers do, isn't it? Ask us to spend more money on cool public works projects, right? Doesn't mean we listen to them.
And it's my understanding that most Americans - and liberal types especially - are opposed to a large, standing army that's ready to go at the drop of a hat. That's what it would have taken to get the tens of thousands of needed troops to New Orleans overnight. And this nonsense about bringing troops home from Iraq to New Orleans... Do you have any idea how expensive that would be? And how stupid? Besides, Pentagon troops operating on American soil has always been a sketchy business from a legal perspective. The National Guard belongs here, but the Army is best left to its own devices. One of the fundamental doctrines of Federal armed forces is that they don't do domestic police work, which is on a historical level, quite an enlightened idea.
So before you decide that this is all Bush's fault (come on now, he now controls the weather? What are you smoking?), think about what we're dealing with.
Time to bust out the criticism of President Bush. While I don't feel the need to go completely insane, I'm starting to think that the Bush administration is really dropping the ball on this one. Not enough is being done. The city is descending into anarchy. It's time to bring some order to the situation, and if that means shooting to kill, then that's what it means. But we've got a semi-major US city that happens to be critical to our infrastructure under water and, as of this morning, on fire.
Dennis Hastert, the Speaker of the House, as made what seems to me to be an entirely reasonable and justifiable suggestion: New Orleans may not be worth rebuilding. We need to rebuild our infrastructure and trade facilities, but the city itself was rife with crime, illiteracy, poverty, and the like. Most of the people have left. Maybe we should just let them. Building coastal cities below sea level is nuts, the Dutch notwithstanding.
Slate is running a piece about race and class in light of the destruction of New Orleans. The vast majority of people stranded and/or being rescued seem to be black. Why? Because they're poor, and couldn't afford to leave, either because they simply hadn't the means to get out of the city, or because they couldn't replace anything should it be lost to looters.
Natural disasters always affect the poor more severely than the rich. By global standards, even the black poor of New Orleans are rich: if Katrina had hit Latin America, the death toll would have been in the thousands, and instead of civil disturbance problems, we'd be looking at widespread plague and famine for the next year. But the journalist is right to note that the people affected most by Katrina seem to be largely black and poor. It's sad to say, but in the South in general and New Orleans in particular, this runs the risk of being redundant.
The only solution to poverty is wealth. It's time we started adopting economic policies that encourage that.
The governor of Georgia has signed an executive order declaring a state of emergency to enable him to enact measures to restrict price gouging at gas stations, where retailers are reported to be charging as much as $6 per gallon.
I'm never in favor of price caps, but I am in favor of not allowing retailers to foster paranoia and overcharge their customers. The situation is different than in Hawaii, and the governor is justified in taking this action. Should, however, the situation deteriorate and there actually be a gasoline shortage - there isn't, at least not just et - the governor will need to let the price float.