One Super Bowl Ad: "Proof" Of The Existence God

Greetings.

Just for a moment, please imagine with me that you are sitting in an advertising strategy meeting at Focus On The Family. Imagine that you've got a story to tell about a Heisman Trophy winner whose mother considered abortion during her pregnancy with a son who would grow to become that very Heisman Trophy winner; imagine you want to tell that story in just a few seconds of TV time during Super Bowl XLIV. Imagine the board of directors is in attendance, that an ad agency is presenting ideas, and that a whole bunch of staffers are brain-storming, probing, dreaming. Imagine the overall theme of the strategy meeting: what can we do to have maximum impact?

Finally, a decision is made: An advertisement will be produced that simply talks about the heroic work women do: that motherhood requires toughness, and yet, even when life tackles women hard, they have the capacity to get right up and keep on being awesome, productive and powerful women. That's it. A simple message, along with a simple visual metaphor -- that life sometimes tackles women with tough problems, like can unwanted or complicated pregnancy -- and yet somehow women for millennia have managed to get through such problems with aplomb.

And since Focus On The Family is a Christian organization, imagine the sort of prayer that was prayed: "Lord, help us to glorify You. Your will be done. Help us reach people the way You want them reached. Help us to be effective, to further Your goals on earth. In Jesus' name. Amen."

And what does Focus On The Family get for an answer? Something that looks an awful lot like a proof for the existence of God.

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Let us be plain: Groups like Focus On The Family believe that aborting children is wrong. They believe that their view of what it means to be moral in the face of any pregnancy -- wanted or unwanted -- is superior to those who disagree with a thorough pro-life stance. They also believe that their position is the more reasonable, loving and restrained one; that their opponents are perhaps irrational, full of zeal, rage and moral confusion. In short, groups like Focus On The Family believe their view is not only pro-child, but essentially pro-woman.

Meanwhile, groups like NOW and Planned Parenthood ALSO believe that they are morally, intellectually and socially upright; that they are the ones dispensing advice in a cool, rational and moral way; that their support of abortion -- in all instances -- is morally defensible. These groups, the ones who support a woman's "right to choose," believe that Focus On The Family is reactionary, blinded by zeal, misogynistic; repressive and regressive. The pro-abortion groups believe they are the very essence of reason, of right thinking, and the very guardians of good advice and wise counsel about pregnancy and family planning.

Then came the mere news of a TV ad.

_________________________

Without having seen the advertisement that eventually aired during the Super Bowl, pro-abortion groups denounced it. They admonished CBS, the network that would show the ad during the NFL's championship game. Some called the ad misogynistic, anti-women. Some expected it would be propaganda against "choice."

And then came the actual ad, broadcast in the opening minutes of the Super Bowl. The very ad that fomented so much blind, irrational, and misinformed discontent. It came like a sheep to the slaughterhouse; it came like a lamb to a dogfight. The ad turned out to be unquestionably pro-woman, pro-mother. It was truly as simple and harmless as a sleeping lamb. And it was beautiful.

What happened? The ad was denounced by pro-abortion advocates as possessing an "undercurrent" of violence toward women.

__________________________

Here are perhaps a few syllogisms explored at the follow-up advertising strategy meeting of Focus on the Family:

If pro-abortion advocates act poorly about an ad they have not seen, then there is a God.

Pro-abortion advocates acted poorly not only before but after seeing the ad.

Therefore, there is a God.

Or this:

If pro-abortion advocates embarrass themselves, then God answers prayers beyond our expectations.

Pro-abortion advocates embarrassed themselves.

Therefore, God answers prayers beyond our expecations.

Or this:

If this ad unintentionally causes pro-abortion advocates to look like they are too irrational to properly counsel needy women, then God performs miracles.

This ad unintentionally caused pro-abortion advocates to look like they are too irrational to properly counsel needy women.

Therefore, God performs miracles.

And finally:

If pro-abortion advocates do not know how to counsel anyone about an unwanted ad, they don't know how to counsel anyone about an unwanted pregnancy.

Pro-abortion advocates do not know how to counsel anyone about an unwanted ad.

Therefore, there really is a God.

Focus On The Family wins a battle -- and maybe even a war -- with nothing more than a simple story of a Mother and her Son. Who could have guessed, really, that the irrational behavior of a group of individuals could have affirmed the faith of millions?

Peace.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Truly Cruel: Tim Tebow, His Mother, And Their "Undercurrent" Of Misogyny

Oh, yes. The deeply offensive "anti-choice" Super Bowl TV ad. One fact is clear: there is no reason to invent absurdities. They just happen.

Check out this absurdity:

The Women's Media Center, which had objected to Focus on the Family advertising in the Super Bowl, said it was expecting a "benign" ad but not the humor. But the group's president, Jehmu Greene, said the tackle [a simulated tackle of Tim Tebow's mother] showed an undercurrent of violence against women.

"I think they're attempting to use humor as another tactic of hiding their message and fooling the American people," she said.

Fooling who? We won't get fooled again.

PS. Please, I beg you, my liberal peers. Don't stop talking.

I Am Sad: Are We All Atheists Now?

Please turn the page, or click the digital exit door, if you came here for words about politics. I am not in the mood. My faith is calling.

I am sad today. Last week I tracked down an old blogging acquaintance; this blogger had closed shop a while ago and I was just checking in to see if anything had changed at that quiet URL. No, the blog was still closed, but there was an announcement: the blogger had become an atheist, a soft atheist. There was a lengthy confessional posted about the loss of evangelical Christian faith; there were some links directing readers to a new start at a new site, and to discussions elsewhere.

I am not simply sad because of one person. I am simply sad because I think atheism is far more pervasive than most Christians understand -- and that the church is filled with people one minute away from rejecting the faith they zealously proclaim.

This is not a polemic I am writing. I could, of course, slide right into one. I could point out how absurd some atheists sound; I could point to that whole set of "leading atheists" who reject the possibility (or the concept) of an "uncaused God"; that such folks are wildly absurd for the simple reason that in one breath they reject an uncaused God and the next celebrate the glories of an uncaused universe. God is summarily rejected because His origin is inexplicable, while the universe is embraced as the totality of Being even though its origin is also inexplicable (and then adored because it is "all a mystery"). 

People have their reasons for believing what they do. I know. But I react negatively to those who assert they are deep when they are really rather shallow. I react strongly to people who think they are critical thinkers when they are really only critical people. I react strongly to atheists who believe themselves the guardians of reason and denounce theists as reason's enemies. Indeed, I react strongly, negatively, to conceit, arrogance; the presumption of knowledge, wisdom, or insight. 

I am not even remotely suggesting my friend falls into any of these categories; I would be wrong to imply such a thing. But I am quite certain that some of those who counseled my friend, at least after the fact, were indeed people oozing with a sardonic conceit. The comments at my friend's blog prove this. 

I am also sad about other things, particularly about the church. I feel like, in many ways, the church itself does not really believe what it proclaims; Catholic or Protestant, it seems that Christians don't really believe anymore. This, of course, is irrational of me, I know. Nevertheless, it sometimes feels as if we're all atheists now. 

When I have a serious issue in my life, a demanding need, to whom am I most often counseled to ask for help? The state. 

When I approach a church with a pressing need, to whom am I often directed? The state. 

If I have need of clothing, food, shelter; if I have addictions or wounds profound, where do I turn? Rarely, if ever, the church, except for short-term help. 

If my house is on fire, who helps me? The state. 

If I need nursing care for my elderly parent, where do I find that help? Who is ready, who is set up, to offer such help? The state, ditto. 

If I've lost my job, or I need health care coverage, do I turn to my church? Does my church hire me when I am without work? Does my church give me Medicare, or unemployment insurance?

I know there are many churches that do great works. But my observation is that churches are only equipped to provide short-term care. In fact, my deep conviction is that American Christians are so involved in pursuit of their own happy lives, they've freely relinquished to the state those things the church had provided for centuries. 

__________________

I read a while back that Catholic churches were reconsidering how to offer Holy Communion in light of the H1N1 outbreak. It seems there was much concern that the Lord's Cup -- the Lord's real blood -- might transmit the flu virus from one communicant to the next. Isn't this an admission that the Lord's Cup is not one whit sacred? Think, really, of what this suggests! 

Forgive my disjointed observations. But there is something seriously amiss in much of what is offered as Christianity. I make no special claims; I have no answers. I am merely venting my own frustrations.

__________________

It's Super Bowl Sunday. Better leave church early: I've something special to prepare. 

For You Football Fans (And Other Geeks)

With the Super Bowl bearing down upon us, I thought the following passages from yesterday's Wall Street Journal might be of interest. In part, the Journal article, "The Time It Takes To Win It All," compares the preparation time required for a team to perform in the NFL with the time necessary for success in other endeavors. Check this out:

"According to an operational study of National Football League teams prepared for The Wall Street Journal by Boston Consulting Group, the typical NFL season requires 514,000 hours of labor per team. That's about eight times the effort it took to conceptualize, build and market Apple's iPod, according to BCG, and enough time to build 25 America's Cup yachts. If both Super Bowl teams dedicated themselves to construction rather than football, their members could have built the Empire State Building in seven seasons.

"If you divide a team's total preparation time by the number of yards its offense gains on the field in a season, you'll find that an NFL team moves at the rate of about 32 hours per foot. And it's only getting worse: According to interviews with NFL personnel, the study's authors say the total prep time per team has nearly doubled in the last 20 years."

The whole article is a fascinating read, especially for those of us drawn toward the geekish.

By the way, here's to watching the Saints go marching in, over and over again.

Peace.

PS. And according to another WSJ article, despite the fact that a typical NFL game lasts about four hours, the football in any given NFL game is only in play -- that is, moving -- for 11 minutes. 

Contratimes Clips: Tebow, Toyota, Etc.

Here's what you already know: Various liberal women's groups, and some liberals in general, are upset with an advertisement scheduled to be aired during this weekend's Super Bowl. The ad apparently focuses on a mother's decision to keep her child rather than choose the abortion recommended by her doctors. The child? Heisman Trophy winner, Tim Tebow. 

Forget what you've heard. The umbrage and alarm over this ad have nothing to do with "choice," since the ad is clearly about making a choice, a choice for life. The real source of liberal outrage is plain and simple: the pro-choice/pro-abortion advocacy groups cannot compete with a story of their own. What happy tale can be shared during the Super Bowl about a woman who DID abort a child? There may be one, but I should think it would be hard to reproduce on film. 

The ad's message, ultimately, is akin to that voiced about suicide: no problem is so bad, no issue so irresolvable, that death is the better choice.

_________________

Toyota has always made incredibly reliable cars, but I never thought them all that exciting. Until now. I mean, for those of us who like an exciting driving experience, "an accelerator problem" sounds like an oxymoron.

What will be interesting is to see if someone crunches the numbers and discovers that Toyota's problems are not all that unique; that when compared to the sets of all cars, cars with design problems, cars with such problems that lead to accidents, and accidents so-caused that lead to injury or death, perhaps Toyota's numbers will be found to be totally within a norm. Maybe this is all media-driven, government-driven hype. 

What do you do, by the way, when your car accelerates unexpectedly? Here's what I do: I throw my clutch (or I put the car in neutral). Or I put my foot on the brake. If that doesn't work, I use my emergency brake.  And if I can't think that fast -- these are all so unusual and complicated, I know -- I shut the engine off. 

But if I am driving a Toyota and none of these works, well, then, I can safely conclude that Toyotas are a total piece of junk. 

_________________

Why do you think Barack Obama and his administration are so enamored of giving criminal trials to people who are clearly more than criminals? I think it might have to do not so much with national security, but Mr. Obama's personal insecurity. After all, this is a man who believes himself a constitutional and legal scholar. Keeping terrorists and enemy combatants in the federal court system gives Mr. Obama the opportunity to speak meaningfully about such matters; it keeps them in what he believes is his wheelhouse. To send them into the military justice system removes them from his many probing pronouncements. But he's insecure; he wants to control his image. And one aspect of that image is that there is nothing about him that is accustomed to, or comfortable with, anything military. He is the consummate outsider, but he mustn't let that be seen.

Keeping terrorists in criminal court, in short, gives Mr. Obama a reason to show-off. 

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved. 

The Audacity Of An Opinion: Thoughts On Perceptions Of Race

[Note: This essay was written over a year ago. I wrote it in response to several rather mean and incendiary emails I got from readers of my 2008 post-election essay, "I Know But Do Not Feel." I post it so late because I needed to let some time pass, of course, being rather raw by the vicious criticism I received. But I also post it because of the recent comments about race made by some of my liberal peers, most notably Mr. Chris Matthews. Odd that I haven't gotten a single email about Mr. Matthews' remarks. Odd, too, that no one who found fault with me minded that Mr. Matthews, white to the core, said that it was his "job" as a "journalist" to make sure Barack Obama succeeds. Surely a white newsman breaching etiquette by announcing the first-ever black president is too weak to succeed without his help should have been perceived -- and denounced -- as a self-righteous oaf given to making racially-charged statements, but he wasn't. Funny. And yet simple and honest words written here, which were not racially-charged at all, elicited serious censure and rebuke from those folks who believe themselves the moral arbiters of all things racial. This merely because someone had the audacity of an opinion about his experiences -- through media, education and society -- of race. - BG]

Not terribly long ago I talked with someone who had a difficult time with my essay on what the racial import of the election of Barack Obama meant to me. My essay was affective in thrust; being intensely personal, it explored how I felt in the wake of Barack Obama’s election. I offered to readers a sort of autobiography: I discussed how I experienced race, and racial justice, in America. I mentioned the role movies, books, sports figures, TV, and entertainers played in portraying the issue of race; I mentioned that I am (along with millions of others) the product of a national effort to eradicate racism via media, art and education. Countless articles have been written and countless interviews given; countless documentaries and essays have been produced, all focusing on the role media have and must play in dealing with racial injustices in America. From film to disc, from poem to song, America has worked on racial harmony -- for decades.

Born in 1961, the same year as Barack Obama, I can’t help but be a part of that legacy. I have been shaped, molded, affected and moved. What person has not? In fact, the vast majority of Americans have experienced racial injustice through media, whether it be through newspapers, books, letters, poems, film or song. I would venture to guess that even many black people, who have perhaps experienced direct racism in their lives at some time, would admit that many of their feelings about race have been formed in the womb of media. Few blacks, really, living today in America can say that they have experienced racism all day, every day, of their lives; I would think there is no one in America, white or black, who would assert that every black and white encounter can be defined as white supremacy and black subjugation; that every encounter a black person has with a white person is racially charged, where inferiority meets superiority or where the disenfranchised meet the enfranchised.

What I am saying is that the vast majority of what any American would call “experiences of racism” are not directly experienced. Instead, racism is experienced only after it has been processed through the media we have come to accept as intrinsic to American life. Few racial incidents actually happen each day in America, at least when compared to the total number of social incidents that occur. But racism via media -- through reportage and screenplays and essays and sermons -- is depicted rather constantly.

Let me put this another way: Remember the story of black churches being torched in the 1990s? Remember how reports that arsons, and fires of undetermined origin, had ravaged black churches across the south in America? I am sure you do. Do you remember, too, that when some astute observer finally did the math; when it was demonstrated that the rate of fires at black churches, including arsons, showed no distinct difference from those fires and arsons at all churches, including all “white” churches, do you remember how the story of racist arsonists just seemed to disappear? In other words, much of what we believe to be racism is merely fueled by the sensationalizing media.

But if the inflated story of arson at black churches does not suffice as an example, let me point to two more events that influenced perceptions of racism in America, both of which were entirely media-driven; both of which were nearly entirely perceived by blacks and whites SOLELY through the media that produced the events. The first is the Rodney King beating in Los Angeles. The second is the O.J. Simpson trial, also an LA phenomenon. The former was undeniably essentially media-driven: the very videotape of the King beating necessarily presented a very narrow, reductionistic view of that event. There was no context, no backstory provided by the videographer. All that was projected was cops beating a helpless black man. As a result of the very restrictions of a camera -- a camera cannot review a wider or total context -- countless figures in media stepped forward to create a fictionalized context for that unfortunate event: Rodney King was beaten merely because he was a black man in America. It is not my intent to comment on the merits of that case; I am specifically talking about how media influenced, even created, the perception of racism. Virtually no one in America, save a couple of people, experienced the Rodney King event directly. Instead it was experienced solely through the media filter, and then shaped to fit prejudices and ideology.

And when the officers charged with assault in the Rodney King beating were dismissed, that dismissal, almost entirely, was experienced by the masses through media. So, too, the ensuing riots.

The OJ Simpson murder trial is hardly any different. This, too, was a media-driven spectacle: it wasn’t the facts on the ground that created the racial narrative that plagued that case, but Simpson’s legal defense team and the media that team exploited who created a racial narrative out of whole cloth. In other words, the racial component was not ever experienced directly by anyone; it was only insinuated, and then passed on through media where it was perceived and apprehended, second-hand and artifically. Call it racism artificially disseminated.

Hence, I can say with some confidence that media of all kinds and shapes have framed all of our experiences and interpretations of race and racism in America. What I noted after the election of Barack Obama was hardly unusual, strange or incomprehensible. The slightest open-minded and honest reflection would have shown that my words were rather clear.

Here’s a question. What do 99.9% of Americans know of Barack Obama, and how do they know it? Answer: Not much, and they know what they know of Barack Obama SOLELY through media. Few people have experienced him intimately, directly and exhaustively. But millions and millions of people believe they know and understand him; they believe they REALLY know him for themselves. But the unalloyed truth is that they know only an apparition: they know him through books, essays, reports, photographs, film and audio clips. Most people know him the way they know many if not most things outside their direct experience. The reliance on media to inform and direct and even shape perception is ubiquitous, irresistible and even overwhelming.

How strange, then, that a person who blithely (and perhaps even blindly) supports Barack Obama finds fault with me because my experience of race in this country is shaped by media and not direct experience. It is not strange, really. Many of us have come to expect such vapidity, even such stupidity, from our interlocutors. Many folks who think they are deep thinkers are really remarkably shallow, closed to any idea that they are indeed shallow.

Let me restate what I wrote in November 2008: While I fully UNDERSTAND what the election of Barack Obama means, both existentially and historically, his election did not FEEL at all new or different. I have seen black men and women in every imaginable high place: Doctors, lawyers, judges, senators, secretaries of state, generals, mayors, governors, astronauts, bishops, news anchors, movie directors, corporate gods, Wall Street millionaires. None of these has been without black representatives for a good chunk of my life; the truth of what I am saying is exactly what made Barack Obama feel so comfortable running for office in the first place. He saw no obstacle, and there wasn’t, and I, and all of us born in 1961, saw no such obstacle, either. Hence, Barack Obama’s election as a person with darker skin than mine did not FEEL SPECIAL -- to me! Nay, it did not feel special or even surprising to me and many of my peers. Is this too hard to grasp? Is this an affront to civility? Is this an indecorous statement to make in mixed company?

Is this the wrong side of history?

So be it. Let the fussy scolds take umbrage at my simple statement of the facts.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved. 

OOPS!

In the process of showing someone how to embed a video on Blogger, I inadvertently posted one here. So, for those of you who receive Contratimes via email, I apologize for the weirdness. The video was quickly deleted. 

Fouad Ajami -- again.

Should the article at this link be mandatory reading? You decide. (And then let me know.)

On J. D. Salinger: Holden Holds In

Permit me to preface this essay with a quote from Ambrose Bearce's amusing The Devil's Dictionary:

DISTANCE, n. The only thing that the rich are willing for the poor to call theirs, and keep.

I did not initially write at Contratimes about J. D. Salinger's death because I did not think there really was all that much to say. Surely there were others with analysis to offer, and mine, should I offer any, would be aptly inferior.  But I did draft a note right after Mr. Salinger's death, posting it on my Facebook page; perhaps those words are a fitting start for what follows:

Though I was not a big fan of The Catcher in the Rye, I remain an avid fan of Franny and Zooey. A legend has died; may J.D. Salinger finally be at peace.

_________________

Let's take a look at a passage or two from the Wall Street Journal essay about Salinger's death, "J. D. Salinger's Long Goodbye":

How can you grieve for a writer who has been, for all practical purposes, dead for half a century -- one defined by his refusal to publish or even to appear in public?

As the WSJ astutely suggests, if only by implication, there is really nothing to say about Mr. Salinger's work that has not already been said, precisely because the man stopped writing a long time ago. Salinger has given us nothing new; he has been utterly invisible for half a century. The WSJ continues:

Salinger, uniquely among major writers, seemed to go in the opposite direction, from public storytelling to private, until he reached the point where it was unnecessary to admit any readers into his fictional universe.

The purpose of "Franny and Zooey," with all its Zen exhortations, was partly to predict and justify this development. When Salinger declared that he was writing for himself, not for the world, he was echoing the words of the Bhagavad Gita that Seymour and Buddy Glass posted on their wall: "Work done with anxiety about results is far inferior to work done without such anxiety, in the calm of self-surrender." Yet this philosophy seems incompatible with the writing of fiction, which is nothing if not an engagement with the world and the self. It seems highly unlikely that the books Salinger wrote for his own pleasure—if they exist—could be as lovable as the books he wrote for the pleasure of his readers.

Really, what more can be said? Salinger's pen turned inward, too inward, apparently, for him to share with the world what it was in the literary life that he found so lovely, so wonderfully freeing and instructive.

When I first read The Catcher in the Rye my sophomore year in high school, my teacher told all of us in class that the easiest way to remember the essence of The Catcher in the Rye was simply to pronounce the narrator's first name -- "Hold In". Our teacher would note, "Just notice what Holden has had to 'hold in', and note what remains 'held in' even after he completes his plaintive confessional at the story's end." It was an easy hook, a helpful if incomplete mnemonic device, to share with listless and distracted sophomores, though perhaps too easy for purposes here. But it makes some sense, as does a college professor's observation that the family Salinger seemed most interested in writing about was the Glass family -- a fragile, lucent collection of souls (Seymour Glass = see more glass). Holden Caulfield was always holding something back, and it seems J. D. Salinger was, too.

_________________

Permit me to talk a moment about envy. Envy is a very subtle, pernicious vice. It is hard to descry as it silently wends through the grasses, through the reeds, thistles and thorns. Envy is sly, and always well-camouflaged.

And let me like others observe that both J. D. Salinger and his Holden Caulfield came from privileged backgrounds. So, too, does Salinger's Glass family. And now that I've made an observation of the rank obvious, I will delve into some of envy's psychology.

Sometimes the privileged don't like to be envied. They see it in the eyes of those they pass; they see it in the doorman or cab driver, or the young children who live in the "mean houses" at the end of the estate's driveway. They hear it in voices -- "You live there?!" -- "You went to Exeter?!" -- "You work in that building?!" -- and what they hear often makes them feel ashamed. Also, sometimes they worry that if they are not charitable enough, or earthy enough, or "authentic" or "common", they risk losing their wealth, their privilege; that the gods or the masses will smite them for being selfish and rich.

Of course the rich and privileged are not exempt from envying each other; when I traveled around the Hamptons, perhaps America's only truly super-rich enclave, I could not help notice how massive and imposing were the hedges circling each estate. But these, or so I felt, were not merely to keep the riff-raff at a distance, they were designed to keep the Vanderbilts from noticing that the Dupont's house was a bit ostentatious, or too big, or impractically small. There is profound envy among the rich; let us not be fooled.

Salinger fell into this whole game, or so I believe. His Holden Caulfield was doing one thing, and one thing only: he was sabotaging the image of wealth and privilege because of envy. On the one hand, he envied all those who still had more -- whose Christmas recess was celebrated not at Stowe, but at St. Moritz. He envied all those who had not just second homes on a lake in New Hampshire, but third and fourth homes in exotic lands; and he damned them. On the other hand, in venting -- in letting out what he held in -- he was also sabotaging the riff-raff's perceptions: he was saying to all the riff-raff out there that "we, the privileged, are not to be envied. We're as phony and unhappy as..." (As whom, everybody else?)

But notice, too, what the benefit of an attack on the life of the privileged has on those who live such a life: it keeps it out of reach. Recall the Bearce quote above, that the wealthy like to give away distance -- liberally. Don't descriptions of the privileged life showing it to be as empty and meaningless and vain and phony as any other type of life protect the privileged life?

Let me put it this way: If you have a friend who recently bought a huge, imposing mansion, and you say, as you tour the estate, "It is so lovely here, it is so beautiful! What a blessing to live in such a place. I am so happy for you," will he not respond with something like this: "Why thank you, but I have to tell you, the taxes are murder"? Might he not say, "We're happy, but boy, the upkeep is absurd"? Yes, he will say something like that, and his intent is this: "Please, don't envy me." And he responds this way because he fears that if he says merely "Thank you," the gods and the mobs will strike him with cancer or take away his wealth, or that he will be judged "greedy" or "avaricious" or "careless"; or that outsiders will declare,  "He thinks he's better than everyone else."

My sense is that Salinger's work was partly this sort of thing: Don't envy me. And yet, as a member of the privileged class in which much was expected of him, perhaps too much, he wrote what he did in part to set for himself what he perceived life's all-consuming goal: an enviable life.

For some people, when faced with the competition inherent in living, they rise to the occasion and they compete. Others, fearful, perhaps, of failure, runaway altogether. Envy is at work even in competition; it could be said that all competition is fueled by envy. But envy's most devastating act is this: feeling that it can't compete, that it can't live the most enviable life of the family or win father's love, envy rejects the idols of the family. So, James' older brother went to Harvard, and James, fueled by envy, rejects his own acceptance to Harvard and thus declares his brother's success as being beneath him; James chooses something more authentic, or earthbound, or domestic; he becomes a writer. But this is not James acting nobly but ignobly: his envy metes out justice on his family by rejecting the family's expectations. And yet, even in so doing, James finds success in that very act; he flees the good life and chooses a life of hidden letters in the remoteness of some wilderness. There he thinks, finally, he has created one of life's most enviable lives: A man from wealth and fame, who rejects it all for a life in the hills, alone, sickened by the phonies who want his attention.

And what does he really get? He lives a life of privilege, in the hills, with the riff-raff and even the muckety-mucks kept at a suitable distance, leaving his family and their privileged neighbors,"talking."

In other words, J. D. Salinger appears to this writer to have written a life with envy's pen solely to carve out a niche in the world of privilege that stands out from the phonies who live in the Hamptons or the Upper West Side. When I hear Holden Caulfield speak, I hear envy's whine, and little else.

It seems to me Salinger created Holden Caulfield merely to be the vicar of envy's ugliest machinations.

_______________

Granted, Salinger may have left us two lifetimes' worth of work in his Cornish, NH home. Perhaps he will explain everything, showing that envy had no hand in his work, his eccentric silence. Perhaps. But there is no doubt he seemed a man who had little peace. May he finally find the peace he was looking for.

_______________

Lastly, I must blame this essay on the very engaging essays of Contratimes reader, Randall Sherman, who wrote two interesting pieces on Salinger, which you can read here and here. 

Also, if you want to read a short story that I think exactly captures the struggle the wealthy have with envy, please read "The Garden Party," by Katherine Mansfield. She ably describes the anxiety the wealthy feel not only about their wealth, but about the gaze that comes from the "mean houses" (I borrowed this as shown above). And just note the irony in this line of hers when you read it in context: "Don't be so extravagant."

Blessings, from my little house in New Hampshire.


©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved. 

Third line, plus

Here's a report of what Mr. Matthews said:

Analyzing Obama's State of the Union address, he called the President "post-racial" before saying, "I forgot he was black tonight for an hour. He’s gone a long way to become a leader of this country and past so much history in just a year or two. I mean it’s something we don’t even think about.

"I was watching and I said, wait a minute, he’s an African-American guy in front of a bunch of other white people and there he is, President of the United States, and we’ve completely forgotten that tonight — completely forgotten it."

I find quite interesting Mr. Matthews' observation that Barack Obama was speaking as "an African-American guy in front of a bunch of OTHER white people..."

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Second Line

Forgive me.

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One Line

You know, while Chris Matthews was speaking the other night, a whole minute passed before I realized I had forgotten he was an idiot.

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MSNBC's Gentlest Host

If you see a man's name repeatedly printed on the FBI's "Most Wanted" list, might you be tempted to think he is perhaps a dangerous character? What if the description of this wanted man included that he was "dangerous, year in, year out"; do you think that might get your guard up, at least just a little? What if the man was described as a terrorist, or what if he was your neighbor? What if the CIA, or the President, or your wife and children, told you that "so and so" is dangerous, year in, year out, and that he was repeatedly named the "Worst Person" in the world by authorities everywhere? Do you think you might find yourself a little anxious, a wee bit cautious? And would it upset you if, in the normal course of everyday life, the man deemed the "Worst Person in the World" was to meet an untimely or unfortunate death?

Let me ask you this: Could it have been possible during the 1930s and early 1940s that Adolf Hitler was considered the world's worst person? It seems reasonable to think so. But if that's the case, do you think it would have been unreasonable or immoral for someone to KILL the worst person in the world, Mr. Hitler? After all, what's the right thing to do with the world's worst person, one who is dangerous, day in, day out? Don't you wish for him to find the grave?

Tonight -- again -- MSNBC's Keith Olbermann listed Fox News' Bill O'Reilly as the WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD. That Mr. Olbermann is obsessed with Mr. O'Reilly is well-known; tonight he even alluded to critics who have pointed out his fetishistic fascination with Mr. Bill. But what was interesting tonight about Mr. Olbermann's  scolding of Mr. O'Reilly is that he presented Mr. O'Reilly as a threat to humanity; that Mr. O'Reilly was literally "dangerous, year in, year out." Mr. Olbermann even averred that Mr. O'Reilly is not a mere provocateur, but a hatemonger, inciting violence against politicians and other public servants. In Mr. Olbermann's opinion, Mr. O'Reilly is directly responsible for the assassination of George Tiller, the infamous late-term abortion doctor who was shot last year while attending church; apparently, or so Mr. Olbermann thinks, Mr. O'Reilly was culpable in that shooting because he opined on his national TV show that Tiller was an incorrigible killer of unborn babies, which, if I am not mistaken, was a statement of fact nearly tautological in structure.

But the irony, the sad, brutal irony, is that Mr. Olbermann is blind to his own hate. He claims Mr. O'Reilly incites violence with his hateful rhetoric. But I think Mr. Olbermann would be hard pressed to find a bit of evidence that Mr. O'Reilly has repeatedly labeled any person on the planet "THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD." There is ample evidence, however, that Mr. Olbermann has indeed  relentlessly abused Bill O'Reilly, reducing him to a hatemongering bigot who is "dangerous, year in, year out." Whose language, really, is likely to lead to violence? Whose rhetoric is aimed at creating animosity, hate, and a thirst for retribution?

Of course, Mr. Olbermann will dismiss his critics: "I am the good guy, and what I do is satire, parody; I tell jokes!" Indeed, Mr. Olbermann is nearly exclusively about jokes. But Bill O'Reilly also tells jokes, and his comments about kidnapping Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, though not hurting them (and MAYBE waterboarding Pelosi), clearly WERE a joke, absurd and silly on their face. Moreover, this is not the sort of joke Mr. O'Reilly tells over and over. But Mr. Olbermann "jokes" repeatedly without humor, without a wink or a smile, that Bill O'Reilly is the world's WORST person; that he is "dangerous, year in, year out" and that he really "is dangerous to Nancy Pelosi." Obviously Mr. Olbermann is not joking, and he knows we all know it.

Mr. Olbermann fails to see that his act of denouncing Bill O'Reilly as a man who "encourages hatred and violence" itself encourages hatred and violence -- against Bill O'Reilly.

This writer is no Bill O'Reilly enthusiast, not even close. In fact, I've hammered him here. But O'Reilly is no Olbermann. Without a doubt the former is a blustering buffoon; but the latter is undeniably and unapologetically hateful, seething with resentment.

What Mr. Olbermann did tonight is really just the bright side of stupid.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Unions Incorporate, Businesses Unite: On Campaign Spending

Numbers are a curious thing.

When the US Supreme Court last week handed down its 5-4 decision permitting corporations to exercise their free speech rights during elections, the hue and cry could be heard throughout the land: "Democracy is dead!" In fact, the lamentations were so passionate and sweeping one expected to see wailing and gnashing of teeth in every public square. However, what one hardly ever heard from the court's critics and the many prognosticators of doom is that the court's decision did two things, and not just one: A) It permitted all corporations full democratic participation, and not just SOME, as the status quo had permitted; B) It permitted UNIONS full democratic participation. Seriously, every person I heard complain about the court's decision never mentioned unions, or that some corporations were exempt from the law's restrictions, the law the Supreme Court essentially emended. Critics and decriers merely griped about faceless, nameless bogeymen -- business corporations.

Here's something you will find utterly amazing:

According to campaign finance data, businesses spent $1.96 billion in the 2007-2008 cycle, while labor and other interest groups spent $673.47 million.

Well, that's not all that amazing, is it? Maybe it will be after you read this:

However, while corporations far outspent unions and other interest groups in the last cycle, that spending, historically, has not benefited one party over the other.

Since 1990, corporations have divided their contributions nearly equally -- 49.4 percent toward Democrats and 50.6 percent toward Republicans.

Union political spending is not so balanced. In the same period, labor unions gave 92 percent of donations to Democrats, while just 8 percent went to Republicans.

So, then, let us do the math for the 2007-08 election cycle, admittedly based on loose percentages taken from the last 20 years of campaign contributions. No, never mind. Why bother? All it will likely show us (though not necessarily) is that BIG NASTY BUSINESS and UNIONS contributed more to Democrats than they contributed to Republicans.

I think the big news here, really, is that very little will actually change as a result of the Supreme Court's decision.

By the way, I am not convinced the decision handed down by the Supreme Court is all that good.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

We Love To Blame: Brief Thoughts On The Haitian Relief Effort

Only a few days after the Haitian earthquake, an old friend of mine said something like this: "Well, Obama sure responded faster to Haiti than Bush did to Katrina, so give one point to Obama."

My response to him was rather thorough, I can assure you, though my response did not include a defense of Mr. Bush. In that response, the secondary point I made is that Haiti was a United Nations and United States humanitarian project long before the earthquake struck. Hence, for Mr. Obama to respond in any positive manner was rather pedestrian, being no more than what any thinking person would do. Responding to Haiti, which was not protected by the levels of autonomous governance as was New Orleans in August 2005, presented little difficulty for a president whose country was already working in consort with other nations in that land.

The primary point I voiced to my friend was that not only were the two situations incomparable, ANY comparison was disgusting political gamesmanship by people exploiting an incident of mass suffering and death. This was NOT a time to politicize, second-guess or mock. This was not a time to sneer, or point scolding fingers. This was not a time for people, pols and pundits, who know nothing about relief efforts in disaster zones, to start barking out "shoulds" and "musts" from the safety of their proud ignorance.

The conversation with my friend ended really quite well, with both of us agreeing that Haiti was just too horrific to be used for sheer political posturing. Our parting was amicable.

Please note, however, that there is evidence I was not wrong, that people will gripe: Three New York City surgeons who immediately responded to Haiti have written that "[t]he U.S. response to the earthquake should be considered an embarrassment." And this from three gifted and heroic souls who were in the very thick of things; in 60 hours of non-stop labor, their teams performed 100 operations on some of Haiti's most damaged survivors. Even the most obtuse of us can understand their frustration: "The death toll from Katrina was under 2,000 people. Deaths in Haiti as of yesterday are at least 150,000. Untold numbers are dying of untreated, preventable infections. For all the outcry about Katrina, our nation [the US] has fared no better in this latest disaster."

I urge you to read the doctors' essay for yourself, which can be found here. The few details they share of the situation in Haiti are compelling, humbling and deeply moving.

It will do no good -- NOW -- to bicker. This IS REALLY a time to congeal together, to quickly learn from our mistakes. It is not a time to take credit or lay blame, or to tally cheap points, or to settle into bureaucratic complacency.

This is a time of war, a war against time, infection, death. Let's got on with it as best we can.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

The Donor MUST Be Cheney! The Company MUST Be Halliburton!

Continuing to maintain consistency with many of his predecessor's policies, President Barack Obama announced today that he has awarded a no-bid contract worth $25 million to a company owned by one of his biggest sponsors.

The White House is ecstatic in the wake of this decision.

"Let me be clear: People need to know I inherited this sort of deal-making when I came into office last year," the President said from the Oval Office, "and, because of the transparency essential to a vital democracy, I have taken the necessary steps to ensure the American public will not know about this sort of thing again."

Many have wondered if the donor was Dick Cheney, as critics of the former vice president often railed against him for his alleged ties with Halliburton, known as the very lair of Satan (and the setting for Dante's Inferno), which enjoyed no-bid contracts during Bush's War of Choice. Mr. Cheney could not be reached for comment, as he was too busy burying more "tectonic weapons" off the coast of Haiti.

PS. Satire intended.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Republicans, Beware.

If Republicans intend on improving their brand over the next few months and years, it seems important that the party learn what it can from the impressive victory of Scott Brown in Massachusetts. What are a few essentials the party should keep from the Brown upset?

Here is what I learned from Mr. Brown's campaign:

1. Stay within yourself. Don't over-reach or overstate. 
2. Just speak plainly, directly. 
3. Use anger gently, and make sure you intellectually, and not just viscerally, understand that anger.
4. Be humble, or at least give the appearance of humility. Steer clear of arrogance. 
5. Listen well. Then speak. When someone asks a question, look directly at the person the whole time. Speak ONLY when your interlocutor is done. (I am not saying Brown has this down perfectly.)
6. Know your neighbors, their worries and fears. REALLY know them. 
7. Don't EVER presume. 

What to worry about now?

1. That the mainstream media, and the DNC, are going to do EVERYTHING possible to up-end Mr. Brown.
2. That Mr. Brown and his party present themselves as entitled, inevitable, or invincible. 
3. That Mr. Brown lets his guard down and says or does something really, really stupid: The press will be watching him more intently than anyone else in Washington, even more than the president. Will he be cautious? circumspect? 
4. That Mr. Brown strays from his focus -- that of representing Massachusetts -- and instead gets pulled into the limelight, the celebrity limelight and all its trappings. Hopefully he shies away from TV appearances and book deals and all that stuff. He can do that later. He's not the new Ted Kennedy.
5. That Mr. Brown becomes too preoccupied with building bridges between disparate views, and thus compromises his convictions for political gain and camaraderie. He must not let himself be perceived as RINO. 

If the Republican Party hopes to succeed in leading America, it must do so with a measured, humble, normal and realistic message, attitude and voice. And if Mr. Brown wants to succeed in the US Senate, he must not spend his time bickering with his Democratic colleagues, debating opponents through the media, or letting others control the debates in which he finds himself. HE must control those debates when Massachusetts and its junior Senate seat are at stake; and he MUST spend time communicating with like-minded constituents at home and across the country.

One thing is apparent: Mr. Brown almost makes being a Republican look cool. And if he is as conservative as he claims to be (on some issues), then his biggest gift to the political maelstrom that is America may be to make conservatism not only look desirable, sophisticated and hip, but to show that it actually is.

Just a few hasty thoughts.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

CHANGE, ONE YEAR LATER

MAN, n. An animal so lost in rapturous contemplation of what he thinks he is as to overlook what he indubitably ought to be. -- Ambrose Bierce

[see also, Barack H. Obama; Keith Olbermann]

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Contratimes Goes Offensive: Talking About Tea Bags

Forgive me, dear readers. I am about to sin. Seriously, DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU ARE EASILY OFFENDED. But sometimes you DO have to fight fire with fire.

There is a vulgar and extremely crude expression used by many in the mainstream media; if those who use it were not liberals, they would be excoriated as homophobes.

The expression takes two forms, "teabagging" and "teabaggers." These are used to describe or label people who have associated themselves with Tea Parties, which are grass-roots protests modeled on the Boston Tea Party of 1773. Such parties have been rather popular over the past year.

If you do not know what "teabagging" is, then brace yourself. "Teabagging" is (generally) a homosexual act in which a dominate male dips his testicles in the open mouth of his partner.

To refer to folks participating in Tea Parties as "teabaggers" is homophobic to its core; it proves my thesis that it is leftists who support gay rights who are responsible for homophobia. It is also patently crude, puerile and vulgar.

Keith Olbermann two nights ago called Massachusetts Senator-elect Scott Brown a homophobic teabagger, proving Mr. Olbermann is a crass child.

How to stop such hate-speech? I have an answer, and it comes in the form of a headline:

Brown Wins In Upset: 'Tea Partiers' Dip Bags in Gaping Mouths of Stunned Democrats

I guarantee THAT will stop Keith Olbermann, Rachel Maddow, Chris Matthews, and Janeane Garofalo from using such homophobic slurs in an instant.

(I am truly sorry to have to post this, but someone has got to stop this awfulness. If I have lost you as a reader, well, I apologize.)

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

With Help Like This: When Martha Coakley's Defeat Began

Massachusetts Democrat Martha Coakley tonight lost her bid for the US Senate left by the late Edward M. Kennedy the moment these words were said on July 22, 2009:

"I don't know all the facts... I don't know not having been there and not seeing all the facts... but... the Cambridge [MA] police acted stupidly...."

If there is one thing I know about Massachusetts folks, they don't like their policemen being abused by anyone, even if the abuser is the President of the United States. The Cambridge police department, it is worth noting, endorsed the Republican candidate for the "Kennedy Seat" over Ms. Coakley, and this despite the amazing fact that Ms. Coakley's husband is a retired Cambridge police officer. Really, what can be said when the police unions in the bluest state reject their own attorney general? One can't help but think her support of the president did not set well with those who felt Mr. Obama misused his power to support a Harvard friend and denigrate a whole city police department.

I think historians should always look back to July 22, 2009 as the beginning of the end for Barack Obama's term in the White House. At least, that date marks the beginning of the end for Martha Coakley and the Democrats' most hallowed Senate seat. That, at least, is how history should score it.

One commentator tonight, a long-time pol who lives in Massachusetts, summed up tonight's loss as a "referendum on arrogance." Interesting, and mostly right. But it is also a referendum on the Democrats' greatest vice, epitomized in the July 22, 2009 remarks made by Barack Obama. That vice is being utterly tone deaf to the truth, and the people.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Quick Hits: Haiti, "Cheating", and Obama's Truck Fixation

There was considerable confusion and turmoil delivering goods to the victims of the 2004 tsunami in southeast Asia. At the time, it was reported that goods, supplies and provisions were not getting to survivors. If memory serves me well, coordinators from DHL and FEDEX straightened out that mess; goods and supplies were routed efficiently and effectively once the professionals got involved.

Sounds like the public sector working in Haiti could use some big time private sector help. Hopefully DHL, FEDEX and UPS, among others, are helping to get things going. Swiftly. But I do understand how difficult such a task is, particularly in Haiti, since the infrastructure to begin with was so limited. If there are only a few roads out of an airport and they are closed, well, there really isn't much one can do.

It's not like many of us in America have had UPS, FEDEX, DHL or the US Postal Service drop packages in our yards from helicopters.

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I have seen at least one TV journalist lose control of his objectivity while covering Haiti. It is clear he has not kept his distance. I am not saying he should, but it is clear his humanity has gotten the journalistic best of him. But there is one fact that people who believe relief is not coming swiftly enough seem to forget: There is no Spiderman. There is no action figure or super hero; there are no Jack Bauers in the world. Relief comes slowly. It's just the way it is. The real world is not TV; the real world is not a movie. No one is guaranteed a happy ending.

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In Massachusetts right now, voters are turning out to elect the successor to Edward M. Kennedy. The two nominees are Democrat Martha Coakley and Republican Scott Brown. As you probably know by now, Mr. Brown has a significant lead in the pre-election polls in a state that is so blue even its clams are Democrats.

In his speech Sunday in Massachusetts supporting Martha Coakley, Barack Obama mentioned Scott Brown's pickup truck six times (Mr. Brown drives a GMC pickup with 200,000 miles on it). Below are all six instances Mr. Obama referred to the "truck":

• "Now, I’ve heard about some of the ads that Martha’s opponent is running. He’s driving his truck around the commonwealth and he says that he gets you, that he fights for you, that he’ll be an independent voice. And I don't know him, he may be a perfectly nice guy. I don't know his record, but I don't know whether he's been fighting for you up until now, but --."
• "So, look, forget the ads. Everybody can run slick ads.  Forget the truck. Everybody can buy a truck."
• "Now, what we're proposing is to make sure that taxpayers get their money back from the rescue that we had engaged in at the beginning of this year, thanks to the bad regulatory policies of the previous administration.  And so we asked Martha’s opponent what's he going to do. And he decided to park his truck on Wall Street."
• "Now, there’s a big difference here.  It gives you a sense of who the respective candidates are going to be fighting for, despite the rhetoric, despite the television ads, despite the truck."
• "So I’d think long and hard about getting in that truck with Martha’s opponent. It might not take you where you want to go."

I have heard others comment about Mr. Obama's truck fixation, but none of these commentators seems to have heard what I hear. What I hear is a man using language that is sexist and racially-charged. Women should be particularly anxious about a man in a pickup truck, as Mr. Obama says: "I'd think long and hard about getting in [Mr. Brown's] truck... [he] might not take you where you want to go." And African-Americans should "think long and hard" about riding in a white man's truck; we all know what a white man in a pickup truck really means.

Maybe I have heard too much. Maybe I am so cynical I can't hear with clarity what a politician actually means. But I have no idea why the President of the United States would use a white Republican man's truck as a reason to steer clear of that man. I have no idea why a pickup truck should be an object of aversion. And I have no idea what a President of the United States is doing scoffing at one of his constituents and all those Americans who have put 200,000 miles on their trucks.

Note, too, Mr. Obama's lovely locution: I know nothing about Scott Brown. But I do know he is this and this and this.

Oh, and one last laugher. Mr. Obama intended to sow fear by suggesting Scott Brown would park his pickup truck on Wall Street. Nice! This from a man who sits in the Oval Office because the largest donors to his presidential campaign were Wall Street financial and banking firms.

Sick.

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MSNBC's Ed Schultz had this to say about the Massachusetts special election:

"I tell you what, if I lived in Massachusetts I’d try to vote 10 times. I don't know if they'd let me or not, but I’d try. Yeah, that's right. I’d cheat to keep these bastards out. I would. 'Cause that's exactly what they are."

Splendid. And Fox News is Faux News!

Did you read Mr. Schultz' apology? Here it is:

"I misspoke on Friday. I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I meant to say if I could vote 20 times -- that's what I would do."

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MSNBC's Keith Olbermann had some nice things to say about Scott Brown:

"In short, in Scott Brown we have an irresponsible homophobic racist reactionary ex-nude-model tea-bagging supporter of violence against women and against politicians with whom he disagrees. In any other time in our history this man would have been laughed off the stage as an unqualified and disaster in the making by the most conservative of conservatives. Instead the commonwealth of Massachusetts is close to sending this bad joke to the Senate of the United States."

I am wondering if anyone can find for me a single personality on Fox News that is Mr. Olbermann's equal? If so, has that Fox News personality EVER said anything as vile about a candidate for public office as what Mr. Olbermann has said here?

Mr. Olbermann, by the way, is a strawweight.

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Just some thoughts.

Dear Fox Business News: DICK GREGORY SHOULD NOT BE INVITED BACK

This morning I wrote and sent the following email to Fox Business News. As you know, FBN produces and broadcasts the "Imus In The Morning" program. Because I care for an elderly woman every morning who likes to watch Mr. Imus's show, I end up watching or hearing a good portion of that program each day.

Here is my email to Fox Business News on this holiday:

To whom it may concern:

This morning's appearance of Dick Gregory on the "Imus In The Morning" program is particularly absurd considering he should have been disqualified from ever appearing again on FBN or Imus after his repulsive remarks of 11/12/2009 concerning the Fort Hood shooting. In November, Mr. Gregory had the temerity to suggest the US Army had somehow conspired to allow that horrible shooting to occur. Such remarks were not only offensive and paranoid, they were intended to sow hate, fear and doubt. Mr. Gregory should have been strongly rebuked and challenged at the very moment those cruel insinuations were voiced.

And the same goes for this morning's reprehensible remarks. That Mr. Gregory was permitted to imply, without evidence, that the US government and its military are not doing their best to help Haitians in the wake of last Tuesday's earthquake is patently obscene. His insinuation that something is suspiciously amiss with the Port-Au-Prince airport's runway being intact and yet the tower is not, and sundry other comments of similar paranoia, should be received with the swiftest and clearest censure FBN can offer. Moreover, Mr. Gregory's remarks about race relations in America are deeply divisive, offensive, delusional and demonstrably false.

Sorry, but that's just how I feel on this Martin Luther King Day.

FBN, and the "Imus In The Morning" program, not only should publicly and clearly distance themselves from Mr. Gregory's offensive comments, they should publicly apologize for NOT confronting such sick remarks immediately, and for inviting Mr. Gregory to speak after what he said two months ago.

Lastly, it strikes me as incredibly curious that Mr. Imus would have as a guest Debra Dickerson, the African-American scholar who wrote an article arguing Barack Obama was not legitimately "black," and Mr. Gregory, who said this morning that African-Americans do not categorize their own according to skin tonalities. Disgusting all around. And that Mr. Imus has not sought noted conservatives like Shelby Steele, Thomas Sowell, Larry Elder, or Walter E. Williams as regular guests  -- outstanding people, all -- is also rather telling. To the casual observer, it appears Mr. Imus is still attempting to atone for something. Trundling out paranoid hate-mongers like Mr. Gregory does not amount to any sort of atonement whatsoever.

Sincerely,

Bill Gnade

A Dire Emergency

If ever the United States needed to respond to a situation, it is now, to the Haitian earthquake. This is a crisis few of us have ever seen. I urge the US president and Congress to act swiftly, fully, and without wavering. This will require the humanitarian equivalent of a major military conflict.

President Obama, I urge you to make an executive decision and extend the fullest -- I mean the FULLEST -- response to Haiti that America can give. This will make Katrina seem a small problem. Or so I predict. Please act. Please focus. Please think about this for more than a few minutes. This is a full-on national and international crisis.

The survivors of the Haiti quake, sadly, are not likely to be survivors for long. What comes next could be far worse than the few minutes of shaking ground. Disease is already afoot. No minute can be lost.

Tragic Thoughts

When I heard about Haiti early last night, I could feel, just for a moment, the despair of Port-Au-Prince. But I am safe in a nice home; I am far away from such suffering. Anything I felt was simply imagined.

It is hard for me to pray. I do offer up prayers, but what, really, do I say? It is not as if I know what the scene is like in that sad country. It is not as if I know what should be done. If there is a God, surely He knows what to do; surely He has already heard the news. I ask myself, as I pray, whether I presume to think my prayers matter when there are hundreds of thousands of Haitians crying out, their faces turned toward the stars. I also ask myself if I think I am hoping to phrase my words, and align my faith with those words, in such a perfect way that God must act, that God must respond? Do I think prayer is mere incantation, a voodoo spell?

I am seeing things, I know. I see a nation in abject poverty; I see chaos, death, despair. I see disease. I see crime. I see revolt. I see war. And I see someone, some Venezuelan or Cuban or even an American, stepping forward to intervene, to calm and charm the Haitian people: I see a peacemaker full of political guile.

It's what I see. I wonder what God sees. Better if I just keep my eyes closed.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Contratimes Fragments: Reid, Gold, Potatoes, Steroids and Mark McGwire

As I peeled potatoes the other night in preparation for the making of a very fine soup, I noticed during this lovely exercise in domesticity that the longer I peeled a potato, the smaller the peels were that I removed. In fact, the last few peels were tiny.

Talk about an observation of the obvious.

Peeling potatoes may be a dreadful parallel to what I consider an absurd optimism about the recent economic news, but so be it. Last month's job-loss numbers -- a mere 85,000 or so -- were considered good news by many who believe in the current president's economic policies. Why good news? Because the numbers were much larger when the current great recession first began; 85,000 is comparably few to what we're used to seeing. But I haven't a clue why this is good news at all, for anyone. All it means, or at least all it COULD mean, is that the peels are getting smaller because there is so little left to peel. Imagine if I took 3 minutes to peel a rather large potato; in the first minute I might have a hefty pile of peels on the cutting board. In the second minute I'd likely produce a smaller pile; in the third, well, even smaller. You get the picture: If all jobs were cut over the next few years would it be good news if, in October 2013, it was reported that the very last job available had been cut? I guess so, since only one job would have been lost that month. Absurd. (The possibility of a jobless recovery seems quite real, by the way.)

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Early last year, as I saw a sudden increase in TV commercials encouraging investment in gold, I made an off-the-cuff prediction that the next great bubble would be the gold market. I don't think, really, that my prediction is all that crazy, despite what G. Gordon Liddy says. Gold as a valued commodity strikes me as almost archaic; its value is not intrinsic, but extrinsic. If this was 1020 AD, gold would indeed be dazzling. But in 2010? Gold? For what?

Seriously, gold strikes me as one of the most inflated things on the planet.

_____________________

Sen. Harry Reid's rather indecorous remarks about Barack Obama and race were without a doubt an indictment not of America, but of the Democratic Party. In Reid's honest opinion, the Democratic Party was not ready to nominate* a black man whose skin was too dark, too quintessentially African; or who spoke in a dialect that was too "Negro." No wonder Democrats are coming to his defense; no wonder Al Sharpton has absolved him so quickly.

Pointing to the history of racism in the Democratic Party is a scary, scary thing.

*I note that this has not prevented the party from electing other African-Americans to lower positions who do not conform to Sen. Reid's image of a good candidate.

_____________________

Baseball legend Mark McGwire's recent admission of steroid use is interesting, particularly since he claims that he used the performance-enhancing substances for health and not performance reasons.

I have heard people argue that all steroids can do for baseball players is make them bigger and stronger, and that such drugs cannot help a batter make contact with a pitched ball: You still have to possess the coordination to make solid contact; strength does not help with that. But such an argument is really a load of bahooey.

Batters gain three advantages from steroids:

1. Since steroid-using batters are stronger and hence able to generate more bat speed more quickly, they can WAIT LONGER before swinging at a pitch. Hence, they have an advantage: they can study a pitched ball longer, and can therefore better predict its trajectory.
2. Since such batters are stronger and thus capable of generating more explosive bat speed, a mis-hit ball can and will travel faster and farther, even out of the park. "Normal" players who don't make solid contact will not get the ball out of the park, whereas abnormally strong players may. 
3. Steroids make all the muscles in the human body faster and stronger, including the muscles which focus and move the eyes. Therefore, steroids help with hand-eye coordination. 

Mr. McGwire should just accept and confess the truth. It's the natural thing to do.

©2010/Contratimes. All Rights Reserved.

Let's Face It: It's A Rough And Tumble World Out There

I've always suspected that life as a drug smuggler in Mexico is rather difficult, but I could never have guessed just how difficult it really is. Perhaps this headline sums it up:

Mexican Cartel Skins Rival's Face, Stitches It on Soccer Ball

Who, I wonder, would have been given the task, and who would possess the necessary skills to perform such a task, of skinning and stitching?

The story sure gives a whole new meaning to, "Wilson? Wilsssoooonn?!"

"Private Talks" On Healthcare: The End Of Public Service?

Moments ago, New Jersey Congressman Frank Pallone, a Democrat, gave an interview on television about "transparency." His answer was stunning, and it included the use of the word "private" at least five times.

Recent complaints have been voiced that Mr. Obama's many campaign promises that C-SPAN would be permitted access to every step of the healthcare reform process (and other legislative debates), have been anything but kept. Mr. Obama, as you know, campaigned as a champion of transparency; his would be the most open and accessible administration in history. (Speaker Pelosi has made similar claims about the Congress she helps lead.) But it seems that C-SPAN is not really happy with the access it has or has not had.

And this is what Mr. Pallone was being asked about: Where, Congressman Pallone, is the transparency when C-SPAN is not permitted access to the current debates between house and senate delegates over the details of a final healthcare bill?

Essentially (and I am not making this up) Mr. Pallone dismissed the charge that legislative transparency appeared rather opaque, saying that the healthcare reform process has been the most transparent legislative process ever. But, he added in self-contradictory (?) fashion, NO BILL could ever be passed without "private discussions" or "private conversations"; that it was impossible that ANY legislation could EVER be passed without "private" dealings between legislators. Hence, C-SPAN had gone far enough, or Mr. Pallone averred. Not everything could be transparent.

So, what does this mean? First, it means Mr. Pallone shows us that Barack Obama's campaign was wrong: the amount of public access to the legislative process has ALWAYS been satisfactory. Mr. Obama's campaign promises that -- finally  -- America could witness for itself the legislative process were foolishly superfluous: NO LAW can be finally legislated EXCEPT in privacy. No amount of C-SPAN coverage will change any of that. In other words, if the amount of C-SPAN coverage of healthcare is fine for Mr. Pallone, coverage that is equal to anything that happened in previous years, then there was no need for promises of "greater transparency."

Second, Mr. Pallone has shown that Mr. Obama, who served a brief stint as the junior US senator from Illinois during his bid for the White House, was making promises out of utter ignorance, OR with utter disregard for truth. Surely ANY senator would know that there is a profoundly well-guarded "private" dimension to legislation. To imply American litigation would be finally fully transparent once Mr. Obama was elected president, as Mr. Obama surely did, was either born of Mr. Obama's ignorance of the PRIVATE legislature that exists in the secret chambers of a PUBLIC house and senate, or Mr. Obama was lying when he promised transparency. He either knew that "no bill" can be passed without "private talks" or he didn't. If he knew it, then he lied. If he didn't, then he was ignorant.

Interestingly, Mr. Pallone is not alone. His defense of "private conversations" -- and keeping C-SPAN at bay -- is also offered by progressive Igor Volsky of the Center for American Progress:

"It’s no exaggeration to claim that health care reform is only possible because of the ritualistic ping-pong back and forth that occurs through private conversations."

Mr. Volsky, in true progressive fashion, added that C-SPAN's access to the whole debate, while part of a transparent process, did not "improve" the legislation or the legislative process. In other words, transparency is wildly important -- at least when George W. Bush was in office -- but transparency does not really "improve" anything.

Huffington Post writer David Sirota summed up Mr. Volksy's argument perfectly:

"[Volsky is saying that] Transparency might be fine and dandy, but it didn't improve anything -- and the only thing that improves anything is secrecy."

In the end, what we discover is that the awful way things were done in the Bush Administration were not all that awful, and that those who have taken up the noble duty of "public service" can only do their best work in "private talks."

Who could have known that there exists such a precious and vital private sphere in the the public halls of Congress?

I, for one, would have liked it if the former senator who occupies the White House had known about this private-sector intrusion on the public sector of Congress BEFORE he ran for office.

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Cover Your Ears! Brit Hume, Ann Coulter, And The Cross

Fox News contributor Brit Hume recently said something controversial -- on TV! -- about the nature of Christianity. Perhaps you heard his blasphemous remarks; perhaps you heard his great insult.

And perhaps you didn't.

Well, at least one person did -- Ann Coulter. I know, I know, she's a firebrand. She's a bombshell bomb thrower; a crass ideologue; a political pit bull. But set the caricatures of her aside for a moment and read what she has to say about Christianity, about it being the best deal on the planet. Is she right? Has Ann Coulter presented the gospel in a way that does justice to the "good news"?

You tell me. I'd love to hear what you think of "If You Can Find A Better Deal, Take It!" And I'd like to hear what you think of Mr. Hume's remarks, too. (Coulter quotes him at length.)

Peace.