From the ever burdgeoning "ooh-wee-ooh file."

That was supposed to represent the theme to "Dark Shadows."(oooh-weeeh-ooooh. Get it?) Mark Shea blogs a post-script to a notorious story from earlier this year which involves a man who is really to young to have popped off from a heart attack.

RIP

FYI

The "death dealer in tight black latex outfit motif" figures prominently in a review of Underworld by Ghost of a flea." Check it out, if you like that kind of thing.

The Law of Unintended Consequences.

I just learned something new about Landlord/Tenant law. I just met with a nice 77 year old man who got here from the Attorney Referral Service. He purchased a fourplex to keep busy and provide himself with some income and activity. One of his tenants has been violating the lease by having far too many people living with her. This, of course, puts a stress on the structure and just beats the living daylights out of the premises.

He probably could have done a Three Day Notice to Cure or Quit, but then he would have played cat and mouse for the next year trying to catch her in a violation and serving repeated Notices. Instead, he served a Thirty Day Notice to Quit. He went to court on the ensuing Unlawful Detainer and the judge sent him home on the grounds that the notice had to be Sixty Days.

I've been doing UD for 20 years. I'd never heard of such a thing. Since 1872, the notice to terminate a month-to-month has been 30 days.

So, I was dumbfounded to find the newly enacted, effective January 1, 2002, Civil Code section 1946.1 which requires the owners of residential property to give 60 days notice of the intention to terminate, but the tenants need give only 30 days notice. Seems like an obvious gift from the Dem Legislature to some constituency and yet another small example of the basic hostility of the Dems to business.

This guy is clearly not the model capitalist that the Dems were thinking of, but he's fairly typical of the small business owner I'm acquainted with. Between this and the incessant threat of being slapped with a discrimination or harassment case, you can rest assured that he will be more careful in screening prospective tenants than he has been heretofore.

Ooh, ooh. Fun Stuff - More on the Kennewick Man.

If, of course, you like this kind of thing. Inappropriate Response who I linked to on the Kennewick post, infra, now has a link to the transcript of oral arguments before the Ninth on the Kennewick Man case. I love reading transcripts from a trial practice perspective. It's always fun to see how other attorneys perform their professional functions. It's also fun to watch the interplay of question and argument and to think about where one could have done better (or worse.)

I haven't read the transcript, but this excerpt bears some review:

Judge Gould: I guess my question - I'm not assuming that one could look at human remains anywhere in the world and say they are Adam and Eve or the original progenitor of the species. That's more a metaphysical question that's outside my pay scale. But assuming that, and this may not be a correct assumption, but assuming that our species didn't simultaneously spring up in every continent in the world then there's probably some migration at some point had hominids or Homo sapiens that get to a place. My question was aimed at is there any limit on time or any limit on time in relationship to current tribes that the government recognizes that relates to what's Native American. I realize that the definition from the Secretary said if you go back to something before European, before documented visits by Europeans to the continent, the people who lived here are Native American. And my question is, is there any limit to that. Would that go back 150,000 years, if people lived here 150,000 years ago.

DOJ Ms. Durkee: Yes, it would cover that.

Judge Gould: Presumably you wouldn't have any other information -

DOJ Ms. Durkee: right

Judge Gould: - that would be discernible about migration.

DOJ Ms. Durkee: I guess I would also like to make another distinction between the hypotheticals as I understood them and in the Adam and Eve hypothetical I understood that we were all biologically then related to this origin, and that might be a factor but let me return to what...I just want to...

Judge Gould: In my hypothetical there might be no biological relationship and probably isn't any discernible biological relationship.

DOJ Ms. Durkee: I'd like to just clarify what Interior approach is, because I think it's relevant to what we are talking about here. What Interior does, it primarily relies on chronological age. However, it looks at all the information that it can in the context and makes a reasoned determination based on all the information available to it. It is reasonable to presume that when remains are found buried in the United States, relate to an indigenous culture if they precede European exploration. But in this case and, you know, in the context in which you are talking about, it's not the only thing Interior looked at and it's not the only thing they are suggesting that be looked at. You look at the entire context. And here, with these remains the contextual clues were fairly limited because the remains were disassociated from where they had been buried, and there were no artifacts to go with them that there sometimes are to give you clues.

Judge Gould: Isn't that partly a problem caused by the Federal Government, the Army Corps of Engineers or whatever, sweeping rocks into the discovery site so there couldn't be other review?

And all that's in the first minutes of oral argument.

The DOJ position is plainly irrational and anti-science.

More Local News.

This article summarizes the current status of the "X Prize" competition. I am, of course, pulling for Scaled Composites to win. [Have to, actually. I was a co-counsel representing Scaled and Burt Rutan in a Federal trial during the week that Gulf War I's air campaign kicked-off. There's some funny, eccentric people over there at Scaled. They've got that brilliant but unorthodox attitude that you see depicted in movies about brilliant but unorthodox scientists. Burt and his brother Dick were both originally from Fresno before they traded up to Mojave - a wide spot on the freeway with a couple of bars. If you're a professional writer type, here's a tip - there's definitely a good book, with movie syndication potential, about Scaled Composites. If you read this and follow up on it, don't forget to send me the standard referral fee.]

More Local News from the Epicenter of California.

The Fresno Bee reports that Bustamante may have been given credit in a class he did not actually attend.

According to this article, Cruz may have been given credit for a course he didn't attend. The class was a public speaking class and the prof appears to have given credit for Cruz's not insignificant body of public addresses.

To me this seems like a so-what scandal. Oh, sure it's embarassing. And, certainly, if it involved a Republican, the fact that Cruz is a Regent at the same time that he gets this favorable treatment would be milked for the "conflict of interest" horror element.

But really - and I say this as a person who went through college in three years by challenging courses - there used to be a process where you could "challenge" a course by taking a test and skipping the course work. Has that procedure disappeared of late?

More unusual is the fact that Cruz didn't get his Bachelors until 2002. How odd is itl for a guy who had time to dabble with MeCHA and was an aid to connected politicians not to finish off a degree? Perhaps Cruz had to go make a living or he didn't find college to be satisfying. All of which could and have happened to many others. A college degree does not make for intelligence, but it can demonstrate intellectual curiosity and persistence. Certainly in a campaign where the attacks have implicitly been on the "bodybuilder's" intellectual heft, this is definitely yet another surreal element in a strange campaign.

Why it's called the "practice" of law.

Robert Musil has a really good discussion of Lawrence Tribe's performance before the Ninth Circuit. If you're a practicing attorney, it's worth reading if only to see that the big names can strike out in the big game.

The Matrix as Gnosticism conceived by Asimov.

Here is an amazingly in-depth deconstruction of the Matrix Reloaded as Gnostic text. I doubt that the writers of the Matrix had all of motifs and symbols which this essay mentions in mind, but it does make for interesting reading. It does have this insight into the reason the machines keep humanity alive:

Understanding why things are the way they are requires an understanding of another holy text: Asimov's Laws of Robotics. The machines, as demonstrated by Smith's need to try to kill Neo even after being "freed," don't have free will. (Likewise, in various theologies, angels and other such divine beings also don't have free will—only humans do.) The bit about the machines needing human bio-energy to survive, as Morpheus (the dreamer) explained in the first movie, is bullshit. The machines keep humanity alive but imprisoned, even after taking over the world, because they were created to serve people. In other words, the machines would like to destroy humanity, but they CAN'T. Instead, they need a human to make the choice.

It does rather explain why the machines are harvesting human heat instead of bovine or hippotomus heat. It also squares with the Holy Text of any connected science fiction reader, i.e. the Three Laws of Robotics (with a nod to Jack Williamson's "With Folded Hands." )

When you have a hammer, everything looks like nails.

Science Daily reports on a scientist who is promoting a dissident position on the cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs. Paleontologist Gerta Keller believes that the Chicxulub Impact occurred some 300,000 years before the mass extinction. Her candidate for extinction is - surprise - global warming caused by volcanism and a series of meteor impacts.

That's fine as theories go. The single meteor strike hypothesis seems unlikely to me since phyla like frogs and crocodiles survived, which is somewhat odd given the fact that we're told today that frogs are unique indicators of environmental health.

But does anyone notice the interrelationship between ideology and science? The meteor impact theory became pre-eminent during the eighties. Oddly, or perhaps not so oddly, during that time - the Reagan era - the obsession of the academic classes was nuclear war and the "nuclear winter" scenario was in full bloom. The meteor impact leading to nuclear winter scenario was exactly the medicine for objective political scientists to push.

Now, of course, global warming has replaced nuclear war as the armageddon du jour and, hey presto, we find out that the extinction of the dinosaurs may have been due to global warming. It makes one feel that the importance of the extinction of the dinosaurs is more psychological than scientific.

Incidently, there is nothing necessarily wrong or remarkable about this phenomena. As Thomas Kuhn in the Structure of Scientific Revolutions demonstrates, paradigm shifts occur in scientists because they are humans working in a human community. Frequently, extra-scientific factors, such as personal loyalty, a view of aesthetics or ideology, promote conversion to a new scientific worldview. So, the idea that the changing views of the cause of the extinction of the dinosuars might be driven by modern political concerns is not surprising. On the other hand, lay people should likewise recognize that science is not an ivy tower affair that is hermetically sealed from the hurly-burly of the workaday world.

From the "Another Example of Europe Leading the Way" file.

"Europe Launches First Mission to Moon."

Can you say, "been there, done that, got the T-shirt." Or, "that's so, like, 1967."

Those crafty Europeans - 100 years behind us in developing democracy; 40 years behind us in space travel; 80 years behind us in hygeine. But they are, after all, the moral conscience of the world.

Most Influential Documents in American History.

U.S. News is promoting a fun project where readers vote on the "most important documents in American History. The hands-down, run-away reader simply has to be the Declaration of Independence, which informed the revolutions of 1770s, 1860s and 1960s. The runner-ups have to be the Constitution and its amendments, both the Bill of Rights and the Civil War amendments. After that, it's dealer's choice.

Recall Mania - Time to start dealing or we're all going to lose this thing.

Like most bloggers, I connect to different on-line legal communities. It varies from blogger to blogger, but for me it's the conservative community, the legal community, "St. Blog's Parish" and, of course, the really tiny on-line SF-geek community, all niftily arranged over there to your left. With that in mind, the recall is not an easy decision. Tom McClintock is the better candidate for a variety of reasons. I don't think Arnold really can govern. I think he's going to smell up the place with a variety of amateurish gaffes because he's an amateur. But, of course, he can get elected and McClintock probably can't.

Among the Bear Flag on-line California conservative community, sentiment appears to be running in favor of Arnold without a second thought. Right on the Left Beach is pro-Arnold ("McClintock's too doctrinaire."). Patterico's Pontification is a reluctant Arnold supporter ("Support Tom by supporting Arnold), which may represent my ultimate position. The Irish Lass appears to be an Arnold sympathizer based on which parties she attends and her counting of endorsements. Miller's Time appears to be strongly pro-Arnold. the Interociter seems to share my concern that Arnold will make Sacramento look like Fresno on the, uh, Sacramento River. Interestingly, Boy from Troi acknowledges that sexual identity politics means voting either anti-recall or pro-Arnold. Although he is being somewhat coy, I am reading him as pro-Arnold. It may be me, but I don't have a take on BlogoSFERICS' position. Ditto for XLRQ (pronounced "jeff"), but I seem to recall him as touting Arnold early. I am not sure about Tone Cluster and SoCal Law Blog or Shark Blog (who live in Washington state anyhow). Slings and Arrows seems to be endorsing the notion that McClintock is a "tool of the Democrats." Prestopundit seems to be focusing on good news for Arnold (all those endorsements) and bad news for McClintock (Bad scenarios for Tom). Pathetic Earthlings is likewise focusing on the inevitabilty of a McClintock loss. Last time I checked, Howard Owens was voting "No" on the recall on principle. I am not clear on Molly's position because her site didn't load text (weird.) I'll bet, though, that in her heart she's pro-Tom. I'm chalking Michael Williams in as pro-Tom (and insanely brave for arguing in public that men are funnier than women.) Daily Pundit's gone "fishin." Calblog's been pro-Arnold since "Conan the Barbarian," and the Angry Clam views Arnold as a "tool" and is just as pro-Tom. Ith is a doll, but I'm not clear on her position on the recall.

So, there you have it. Out of 22 California conservative bloggers, something like 14 of them are strong or moderate Arnold supporters. 2 or 3 will support Arnold because he can win. Only one, and maybe me depending on how I feel next week, are drink-the-cool-aid pro-Tom.

Here's the problem. That's the survey of the political cognoscenti. Here's the view from a section of the electorate that is simply being ignored and told to compromise their views for the greater good. According to RC blogger and writer Mark Shea:

Vote for McClintock!

But he'll make the Stupid Party lose in California!

[Evil grin]. Yep. Sure will!

You see, the leadership of the Stupid Party has traditionally held prolife conservatives at arms distance, but still firmly by the family jewels, saying, "Hey! If you don't support us, the Evil Party will win. You wouldn't want that now, would you?"

It's like a Mafia Protection Racket.

Well, now the leading Stupid Party Candidate in California is indistinguishable from Hillary except for a couple of vague points vaguely suggesting some vague misgivings about Partial Birth Abortion.

Whoopti-frickin-do.

The Feds can give us a Partial Birth Abortion Ban. Who cares what the governor of California does.

So basically there's no reason to vote for Arnold. I say, "Vote for McClintock, give the state to the Dems, and make it extremely clear to the Stupid Party that they can't treat their base like shit and expect to succeed."

Exorcise the Spirit of Rockefeller! Vote for McClintock. Hand cynics running the Stupid Party a well-deserved defeat.

Shea's sentiments shouldn't be disregarded. He has 75 comments after his post and getting a referral from Shea is second-only to a referral from Instapundit (or posting about n*ked Amb*r F*y pictures.)

And why is Shea wrong? What I'm seeing from some Arnold supporters is the idea that conservative positions are losers in California politics. Here's an excerpt from mystery writer Roger Simon's blog concerning his reasons for not supporting McClintock if he were a Californian:

2. HIS REFUSAL TO SUPPORT DOMESTIC PARTNERSHIP LEGISLATION FOR GAYS: Perhaps I am biased because I have so many friends and family who are gay, but this is out-and-out bigotry to me. And I can't imagine anybody being a successful governor of California with those kind of antediluvian attitudes, not in 2004.

Antediluvian attitudes? Simon is referring to attitudes that were unquestioned all of two years ago. Bigotry? Forget reasoned anthropological concerns. Forget the fact that domestic partnership legislation is generally uneccessary and a domestic partnership law has been in effect for several years in California. It appears that supporting Arnold means renouncing "bigotry" and supporting whatever is most trendy in social restructuring. Thanks, but if I'm going to have my deeply held beliefs submarined - and be called names in the process - I'd rather it was done by someone I hadn't voted for.

It is the simple truth that this kind of talk makes me want to drink the cool-aid and hand the election to Cruz. And if I - a moderately conservative Republican - feel that way, does anyone really think that Arnold stands a chance even if he picks up every endorsement from every county chairman? It's time for some serious fence-mending. It's time that Arnold throws something to the Republican base or we are going to see Bustamante as Governor.

Update: Ith reports that she is a pragmatic Arnold supporter. (But the real question I want answered is what she thought about Underworld. I thought it was a confusing farrago of half-thought out plots and easily forgettable, except for the whole "death-dealer in tight latex outfit" motif, which kind of worked for me.)

Patterico's Ponifications corrects my understanding of his position. He is not yet in the Pro-Arnold camp, rather, he like me is torn between principle and pragmatism and will wait to make up his mind. His bargain with Mrs. Ponifications suggests an "exit strategy."

Boy from Troi on the other hand, thinks I've got it all wrong. Arnold is a "new kind of candidate" who doesn't appeal to the "wacky right." But that's my problem - the whole name-calling thing. I hadn't realized that not signing on to the whole Gay Rights agenda made me "wacky." And, let me ask this, once you have a Republican adopt those positions, why should the people who support those positions support a Republican position anyway. Aren't the people who prefer the extreme social programs of the Dems - which Arnold signs on to - more likely to support leftish economic programs anyhow. On the other hand, people like me - and we are not an insignificant portion of the Rep party - might feel rather slighted, particularly after the serial shocks of Lawrence, the Episcopalian Bishop, the Domestic Partner law - and decide to vote our conscience, as suggested by Mark Shea and others. [A cautionary note to anyone who might want to read me into the "homophobic" or "bigoted" "religious right. " Read my job description in the upper left and ask yourself how many homosexual discrimination cases I've represented on behalf of the plaintiff. My equal-rights credentials are bona fide.]

Local and Internet News

In case anyone has missed this story, here it is - A lawyer for Free Republic filed a claim Monday with the city of Fresno, contending the Human Relations Commission defamed the local conservative organization with a news release labeling it "a hate group." The Free Republic is a conservative-oriented news and commentary site that seems to have some notoriety on the right-side of the internet world, and, oddly enough, is based here in Fresno. The head of the local Human Relations Committee, which I believe is a city agency, described it as a "hate group." Fresno's mayor, Alan Autry, who played "Bubba" on Heat of the Night, if you haven't been keeping track of Fresno politics described the HRC chairperson's comments as "inflammatory, reckless, irresponsible and dangerous."

Can't say anything more. We may get the defence of the city in this case.

Interesting and Useful Internet Site.

If you like this kind of thing. Someone -actually Christopher Blosser - has gone to the time, trouble and expense of setting up an unofficial online archive of the works Avery Cardinal Dulles. Beyond his exceptional biography, Cardinal Dulles is a first rate thinker whose reflections always seem to yield nuggets of gold. I strongly recommend him to anyone interested in society or the human condition. I also strongly recommend that readers who are not acquainted with his works set aside their prejudices and give it a try. Dulles' writings don't contain the religious, biblical or doctrinal edge that the uninformed lay reader might expect. The archive contains many of his First Things essays and are therefor directed to a knowledgeable lay readership.

Certainly Dulles' theological perspective inform his viewpoints, no one is necessarily going to come away looking for scapulars or icons. In True and False Reforms, Dulles is writing about Catholic issues, but his observations are true for broader society:

For similar reasons we must be on guard against purported reforms that are aligned with the prevailing tendencies in secular society. One thinks in this connection of the enormous harm done in early modern times by nationalism in religion, a major factor contributing to the divisions of the Reformation era and to the enfeeblement of the Catholic Church during the Enlightenment. The liturgical and organizational reforms of Joseph II in Austria, the Civil Constitution on the Clergy enacted in France in 1790, the extreme liberalism of Félicité de Lamennais early in the nineteenth century, and the evolutionary religion of the Modernists at the dawn of the twentieth century—all these movements afford examples of initiatives perfectly attuned to the spirit of their times but antithetical to the true character of Catholic Christianity.

Likewise, if the modern tendency runs in the direction ensuring that decisions have no consequences, one ought to suspect the wisdom of "reforms" that move in that direction.

More Anthropology.

Surfing the net from the Technorati link on the Peter Wood essay, infra, led to Moira Breen's site that led to Friends of the Past website which discusses the oral arguments that occurred before the Ninth Circuit on the "Kennewick Man" case earlier this month.

What an absurdity that case is. Anyone who believes that the RC Church stands indicted for all time for supposedly oppressing Galileo because of his scientific theories should be expressing unceasing outrage over this case. Scientists are actually being prevented from studying a skeleton and an archeological site because it might show that the population of the earliest migration into North America was possibly more diverse than ever suspected. And this political oppression of science is predicated upon Native Americans having some link to a person from a population that was probably replaced a dozen times over because of the inevitable effects of migration, genocide and extinction. How does that make any sense. What link do I have to an inhabitant of Ireland circa 10,000 BC given the fact that the Indo-European replacement language, culture and people were still firmly ensconced most probably in Anotolia at the time? Perhaps, scientists should be prevented from studying Neanderthals because maybe - just maybe - modern Europeans received some genetic contribution from the extinct Neanderthal population?

Yet, while people can still get upset over a mischaracterization of Galileo in the Sixteenth Century, there seems to be a strange silence over this modern example of ideological control over free scientific inquiry.

The Varieties of Human Sexual Experience.

[Thanks to Mark Shea for the link.]

This essay by Peter Wood provides a nice summary of the anthropological evidence for the effect that institutionalizing plural marriage or homosexual marriage might - and most probably would - have on society.

Arguments about instituting homosexual marriage tend to revolve around either of two poles. One pole is based on the morality of homosexuality; the other is based on equating homosexuals with the "discrete and insular minority" model mentioned in the Carolene Products decision. But the invisible elephant in the room ought to be the sociological effect that such a change could engender. The elephant is invisible because most Americans truly believe that our society's ideal of free and autonomous individuals and equality between the sexes is somehow normal.

The truth, though, is that our society and its ideal are not in any sense normal. Any knowledge of history shows how aberrant Western Civilization is in the broad sweep of human history and cultural variation. The aberrance of Western Civilization is one reason we are so hated by traditional elements of the Islamic world.

Our society was formed from a unique set of circumstances, not the least of which was the whole emphasis on monogamous heterosexual life-long marriages which certainly elevated the status of women in Christian Europe relative to what had obtained in the pagan world. Another factor which elevated the relative status of women and children in the West were the "Victorian (and Christian) 'hang-ups'" on sex which tended to "decommodify" sex and lessened the exploitation of the obvious vendors of sex - women and the young. The lot of the young in Dickensian England might have been squalid and grim, but there were those pesky Christian social improvement groups that pressed for reform. Would that have occurred if the status of women and the young was such that working in a brothel was considered normal and unremarkable as occurs in those parts of the world mentioned in President Bush's speech before the United Nations?

There is good reason to believe that our society uniqueness may be more fragile than anyone suspects. Consider this passage from Wood's essay:

But that just shows that the polyamorists are too busy groping toward their particular form of sexual self-expressions to understand the consequences of abolishing monogamy. Eliminate the one-man-one-wife rule and, yes, the polyamorists could openly do their thing but so could a lot of other people. Should the polyamorists have their way, plural marriage would, almost of a certainty, emerge in its classic form of rich older males dominating much younger vulnerable females.

This is not a “slippery slope” forecast. It is more definite than that, since we know for a fact that everywhere and at every time human societies have made plural marriage an option, this is what happens. Given a free market and no rules against plural marriage, human beings will find themselves in a hierarchy dominated by older men with multiple younger wives.

It couldn't happen here, could it? But it has happened anywhere it's been tried and given the iron rule of testosterone, I would want a coherent explanation as to why and how human biology and reproductive strategies have evolved in the last fifty years.

Rome did not fall in a day. It took decades during which the elites found themselves less attached to the ideal of serving the state. Decades during which the most productive men - men like St. Augustine - disengaged themselves from civic functions and walled themselves in small communities in the wilderness. We will not live to see the return of purdah, but if history is any indication, and if the logic of the Lawrence decision plays out, our grandchildren probably will.

Update: Secret Agent Man offers his thoughts on the Wood's article. As does The Mighty Barrister and Lane Core. Noli Irritare offers a round-up and analysis of various discussions fostered by the Wood's essay.

The speech was barely over and Paula Zahn was opining that this speech was a failure.

Here is the text of President Bush's speech to the United Nations. Odd, but I don't notice any capitulation to European sensibilities or any lashing out against the UN.

Instapundit called attention to the lengthy passages on international slavery. They bear some reflection:

There's another humanitarian crisis spreading, yet hidden from view. Each year, an estimated 800,000 to 900,000 human beings are bought, sold or forced across the world's borders. Among them are hundreds of thousands of teenage girls, and others as young as five, who fall victim to the sex trade. This commerce in human life generates billions of dollars each year -- much of which is used to finance organized crime.

There's a special evil in the abuse and exploitation of the most innocent and vulnerable. The victims of sex trade see little of life before they see the very worst of life -- an underground of brutality and lonely fear. Those who create these victims and profit from their suffering must be severely punished. Those who patronize this industry debase themselves and deepen the misery of others. And governments that tolerate this trade are tolerating a form of slavery.

This problem has appeared in my own country, and we are working to stop it. The PROTECT Act, which I signed into law this year, makes it a crime for any person to enter the United States, or for any citizen to travel abroad, for the purpose of sex tourism involving children. The Department of Justice is actively investigating sex tour operators and patrons, who can face up to 30 years in prison. Under the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, the United States is using sanctions against governments to discourage human trafficking.

The victims of this industry also need help from members of the United Nations. And this begins with clear standards and the certainty of punishment under laws of every country. Today, some nations make it a crime to sexually abuse children abroad. Such conduct should be a crime in all nations. Governments should inform travelers of the harm this industry does, and the severe punishments that will fall on its patrons. The American government is committing $50 million to support the good work of organizations that are rescuing women and children from exploitation, and giving them shelter and medical treatment and the hope of a new life. I urge other governments to do their part.

We must show new energy in fighting back an old evil. Nearly two centuries after the abolition of the transatlantic slave trade, and more than a century after slavery was officially ended in its last strongholds, the trade in human beings for any purpose must not be allowed to thrive in our time.

Odd, again, but this issue is practically absent from public conversation. We hear about the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade prior to British interdiction endlessly. Yet, oddly, again, we hear nothing about this modern evil.

All of which makes one wonder how the UN has missed this evil, or failed to notice it, or how manyof its members are benefitting from slavery.

By the way, for a Hollywood-based comedian, Captain Spaulding can certainly deconstruct a poll. [Links are not working. Check out the September 22, 2003 @ 2:41 entry.] I like this observation:

And speaking of poorly worded questions, the fourth question of the poll asking if Hussein "had already developed weapons of mass destruction" doesn't indicate if it means ever or recently. If it meant ever, one wonders if the 19% not likely (either "very" or "at all") think Hussein gassed the Kurds in 1988 with his mind.

I have run that point past a few liberals and witnessed their minds seize with the cognitive dissonance of reconciling (a) Bush lied about Saddam having WMD with (b) Saddam actually having (and using) WMD.

Legal Reader links to Michael Moore's endorsement of Wesley Clark. Another reason to oppose that man.

Recall Hijack Hindered.

Here is the link to the decision allowing the recall to go forward in October.

The gloating over "pay back" that I've heard several times in the mainstream media now has a pathetic quality. The gloating had a "biter bit" theme based on the premise that the liberals were simply using the Bush v. Gore precedent against conservatives.

But the two factual scenarios were never even close. In Bush v. Gore, a partisan Florida Supreme Court was overturning the fact-based decisions of Democrat Florida trial judges in an attempt to hijack a national election. It was doing so by creating ex post facto criteria for counting votes in order - some might argue - to facilitate the hijack. The Supreme Court decision - although it was perhaps partisan - had the virtue of returning the election to the condition ex ante, i.e, to the result that existed after the count and the recount, and after the Democrat trial judges had made their basically non-partisan decision.

(As a side note consider this observation: I think any practising attorney would agree that the work-a-day trial judge is going to be more inclined to follow established law as a rule of decision and less likely to tangent off onto the course of creating law as a vehicle of social engineering. It can happen to the contrary, but trial judges are generally more inclined to treat the law as a body of existing rules that are supposed to be applied somewhat mechanically. Note, therefore, in both Bush v. Gore and the California Recall decision that the trial courts get the decision "right" from the beginning.)

The Recall decision in contrast involved a purely state election in which the state had an overwhelming interest. Further, insofar as we know, no one was crafting a scenario which would necessarily or probably hijack the election into any particular result. The electoral process, for example, has regularly elected Democrats for years.

On the other hand, the California Recall decision did have the unprecedented intent of suspending an election. This country had gone through wars without suspending elections. Normally, suspending an election would have resulted in certain quarters hysterically protesting an imminent end to democracy. In this case, though, we hear ..... crickets.

Now that this judicial aberration has been reversed, we can now see what a shoddy piece of partisan work it was all along.

Update: I've just finished reading the Opinion. In a nutshell, it's a fairly decent primer on Remedies. The issue boils down to whether injunctive relief is appropriate and this in turn requires the plaintiffs to show that (a) they have a probability of success on the merits and (b) that the "balance of hardship" strongly favors injunctive relief. On this last point, the Court compares the potential statistical possibility of miscounts versus the real harm done to candidates who have made financial decisions based on a short campaign period and the to the State which certainly has some real interest in seeing that its constitutional procedures be followed.

QED - the trial court was right and the partisan appellate hack's "thumb on the scales of justice" approach was wrong.

Which kind of reinforces my initial point. Law at the ground level is really about solving problems. While the District Court judge may have a dream of being the great Solon dispensing perfect justice that will be remembered for millenia, but today he has only a limited time to turn out this case before turning his attention to the pretrial on the drug case, the CMC on the race discmination case and the 240 other matters on his plate. He, or she, wants an answer, and would prefer that the answer be the "right" answer. So, he, or she, turns to the recipe for granting preliminary injunctions and decides that theoretical inconveniences that might be avoided in the polling booth are less compelling than real time and real money being dedicated by real people. (Incidentally, I have my voter pamphlet. How much money would have been wasted in that process alone, if the injunction had been affirmed?)

The average trial court judge will typically let the grandstanding political gestures go in favor of trying to apply the rules.

Internet Museum of the Unusual and Cool.

This is the link to the Patrick Stewart Official Website. It's chock-full of geeky Prof. Xavier and Jean Luc information. Also, I hadn't realized that he was "Karla" in the BBC's excellent version of "Smiley's People." [Actually, that's how I got to PSN.org. I was looking for "Tinker, Tailor, Spy" on DVD and stumbled across this site. Incidentally, I was motivated to begin that quest because I have recently acquired another BBC serial - The House of Cards Trilogy where Ian Richardson is brilliantly cast as an evil, machievellian, conniving Torie whip who schemes his way to power. Great series if you like that kind of thing.]

The Sage of Selma Speaks.

This Victor Davis Hanson essay made me think something like "yea, what makes them think they have the right to offer their opinion - they couldn't organize a one car parade without killing thousands of their elderly:"

Yet sophistication is not morality. Neither is nihilism. More people, remember, fried in France this August while its social utopians snoozed at the beach than all those lost in Kabul and Baghdad together. I think an American pilot who flew over the peaks of Afghanistan or a Marine colonel now patrolling in Iraq was far more likely to ensure that his aged mother back home lives under humane conditions than was a Frenchman this summer on his month-long vacation on the Mediterranean coast. So remember, this August Americans lost 100 brave soldiers fighting selflessly for the liberty of others while thousands of Frenchmen perished through their children's neglect and self-absorption.

On other VDH news, I am afraid I have to report that I didn't get to his talk at the Fig Garden Bookstore this Saturday. I didn't know about it until I ran into someone at the local Borders who was buying Kagan's book on the Peloponesian War. Doh! My office is within a stone's throw of the Fig Garden Bookstore and the last time he had a talk there, it was the one carried on C-SPAN right after 9/11, and I missed that too.

Via Heinleinblog you can find a comprehensive list of the Robert Anson Heinlein's works. I find it kind of interesting that the first three of Heinlein's publications - Life-line, Misfit and Requiem - were prequels or sequella to other major works. Also, I hadn't realized that Heinlein wrote under a pseudonym. The list makes for a nice nostalgic trip.

Communio Thursday - Capitalism and Christian Ethics.

This is altogether timely.

Our Communio Circle met Thursday and the discussion focused on this column by John Allen Jr. in National Catholic Reporter. As I understand it, NCR occupies the same position relative to Catholicism that the New York Times does - holding down the far left flank, but allowing some territory to remain to the "fever swamp left." The Allen article has a "man bites dog" flavor to it, which starts out with the title "Is John Paul II too liberal?" The article then goes on to discuss the split between the NeoCon Catholics like Michael Novak and Richard John Neuhas of First Things, who are described as "Whig Thomists," and the Communio affiliated writers, such as David Schindler and Alasdair McIntyre, whose "school" is given the clever sobriquet “postmodern Augustinian Thomism.”

I found the article is interesting for discussing Communio and Marxist turned Thomistic philosopher Alisdair McIntyre - both of which I've recently begun to study.

More importantly, though, is that the debate shows that there remains a substantial tension between the ethics of capitalism and the ethics of Catholic Christianity. The NeoCons were, of course, famous for their project of making capitalism more congenial for Catholic intellectuals. This was no mean project given the fact that when they started their project socialism looked like the likely winner of the hearts and minds of world political and religious leaders. Ultimately, this project was vindicated by the 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus

The Communio group, on the other hand, as "right wing post-modernist" look askance at this development as yet another compromise with the "modern" world. ("Modern" in the sense of anything after 1699.) With that said, I'll confess I have seen nothing in Communio that even faintly resembles and economic or political program.

I don't know how significant the debate is given the fact that you have significant thinkers like Avery Cardinal Dulles who write for both Communio and First Things. [Cardinal Dulles, incidentally, is the son of John Foster Dulles, who gave up his father's political patrimony when he converted to Catholicism. There's an interesting biography there someday.]

That doesn't mean it's not an interesting debate. Christopher at Against the Grain is creating a blog to cover and discuss these issues. Go here for his comprehensive list of links on the players and here for for his analysis of recent Catholic critiques of capitalism and the "Whig Thomists'" attempt to synthesize a fusion of Catholic ethics and capitalism.

Greg Krehbiel thinks that Eric Burns of Fox News is over the top in his review of "Inside the Actor's Studio." Burns was particularly repelled by the fawning syncophantic host's telling the audience - 240 students seeking a Master's in Film - that they should seek in future years to earn the privilige they had been accorded that night of listening to him interview Tom Hanks. Burns writes:

It is one thing to suck up to a celebrity. It is another to be told that it is a privilege to do the sucking. It is yet another to admonished that one must work hard in the years ahead to be worthy of that privilege.

This is not to criticize Tom Hanks. I think he is a fine actor.From what I read, he is also a kind and civil and perceptive human being. So much so, in fact, that I would like to think he was at least a little embarrassed by Lipton’s fawning, obsequious, tongue-abrading performance.

I would like to think as well that, when Hanks heard Lipton tell the students to “earn this,” he thought, if just fleetingly, just for a moment, that young Americans do not need to earn the right to be in the presence of actors, even superb, Academy Award-winning actors like Hanks. Rather, they need to earn the right to be in the presence of scholars and statesmen and people who have achieved notably in science and medicine and engineering and the management of civic affairs.

They need to earn the right to be in the presence of men and women of character and conviction, of integrity and dedication. They need to earn the right to be in the presence of those who found charities and are in other ways boons to society.

I think Burns makes a sound observation. And why do we need 240 new Masters of Film anyhow?

This is Remarkably Therapeutic for a Saturday Afternoon.

Design your own Hell.

General asshats
Circle I Limbo

DMV Employees
Circle II Whirling in a Dark & Stormy Wind

Militant Vegans
Circle III Mud, Rain, Cold, Hail & Snow

Scientologists
Circle IV Rolling Weights

PETA Members
Circle V Stuck in Mud, Mangled

River Styx

Qusay Hussein
Circle VI Buried for Eternity

River Phlegyas

Uday Hussein, Saddam Hussein
Circle VII Burning Sands

Osama bin Laden
Circle IIX Immersed in Excrement

NAMBLA Members
Circle IX Frozen in Ice

Design your own hell

Cal Politics.

This post from Jockularocracy is kind of interesting. "Jock" says he interacted with Fresno's Native Son and former Sec of State Bill Jones over Jones announcement that he will be challenging Boxer for the Senate next time out. More interesting, Jones offered to pull out of that race in favor of McClintock if McClintock pulls out of the gubernatorial race. Probably nothing will come of this, but it was a nice gesture.

Philip Jose Farmer was from Peoria?

That's what Peoriapundit claims. I don't know why I'm surprised. I just thought PJF was more a Hollywood or So Cal kind of guy.

Go check out the Peoriapundit's blog. Peoria's kind of the Fresno of the Midwest. [Except I'm sure in Peoria, they prefer to think of Fresno as the the "Western Peoria."]

After that, check out his Heinlein Blog.

Back to Serious Political Issues.

[Via Jane Galt.] Jedi mind control techniques could be the only explanation for why this guy is the only Democrat in the field that I would ever consider supporting.

Rich Galen directs readers to his excellent essay from last year.

Two for one post.

This is the post I wrote for my Rotary Club's Bulletin-

September 11, 2003

As we go to our meeting this Thursday, we will all certainly reflect on the memory of the horror that we felt only two short years ago. It was like a shot to the gut for weeks as we realized how many had died and how many could have died but for luck of many and the sacrifice of a few. We learned that there were those who so hated and misunderstood America that they were willing to spitefully throw away their own lives so long as they could murder multitudes of defenseless civilians whose only offense was going to work. The cliché is that the world changed two years ago, but it didn’t. The world was the same on September 12, 2001 as it had been on September 10, 2001. We were the ones who changed when we learned that our generosity and good will by themselves weren’t talismans against malevolent paranoid hatred.

Rotary and Rotarians are necessarily on the front line. The commitment of Rotarians to “Service above Self” makes Rotary a symbol of all that is good about our civilization. The example Rotary sets is therefore corrosive for those who would lead their civilization in the direction of the bitter hatred that resulted in the tragedy of September 11, 2001. This ABC News Report excerpt from September 4, 2003 says it all:

Key Bali bomb suspect says US the real terrorist

One of the most senior Jemaah Islamiah (JI) operatives charged over the Bali bombing has told a Denpasar court he is only a small terrorist, while the big fish causing terror is the United States.
Mukhlas also accused Rotary and the Lions Club of being part of a conspiracy to Christianise Indonesia.

Like it or not, it seems that as Rotarians we’ve been conscripted in this war. The terrorists have enlisted us on the side of civilization. We can and will win this fight. Everyday since 9/11/01, we have been helping our side win simply by showing up at meetings and supporting Rotary’s activities in Fresno and in the world.

It’s the right thing to do.

If it annoys Jemaah Islamiah, Hamas and al Quaida, so much the better.

The odd thing is that it really doesn't take much to find quotes where Hamas or other terrorist groups condemn Rotary. Think about that for a moment. You're a terrorist. You're being sentenced to death. And you take the time to condemn Rotary?

It does seem disproportionate. But maybe it says quite a bit about the role that collective community service organizations play in the developing world. Sadly, that role is not as important here in the First World, where the membership of service organizations has been declining since the 1970s.

Fight terrorism. Join Rotary.

Go and read this tribute.

Thanks to Michael Williams for directing us to the moving post about Rick Rescorla - just one of the quiet heroes whose life gives hope to the rest of us.

Here is the Heritage site for us embattled neocons.

James Lileks has some typically powerful prose about life, risk and remembrance. Read this:

The world will not end. It will roll around in its orbit until Sol expires of famine or indigestion. In the end we’re all ash anyway - but even as ash, we matter. The picture at the top of this page is a sliver taken from a 9/11 camera feed. It’s the cloud that rolled through lower Manhatttan when the towers fell. Paper, steel, furniture, plastic, people. The man who took the picture inhaled the dust of the dead. Somewhere lodged in the lung of a New Yorker is an atom that once belonged to a man who went to work two years ago and never came back. His widow dreads today, because people will be coming and calling, and she’ll have to insist that she’s okay. It's hard but last year was harder. The kids will be sad and distant, but they take their cues from her, and they sense that it's hard - but that last year was harder. But what really kills her, really really kills her, is knowing that the youngest one doesn’t remember daddy at all anymore. And she's the one who has his eyes.

Two years in; the rest of our lives to go.

This post deserves wide circulation. It details ANSWER Coalition - which organized the anti-war protests this spring - complete indifference to the plight of Iranians who want freedom. The lack of comprehension by these crypto-Stalinists is stunning. They apparently can't conceive that anyplace other than the United States could possibly be "imperialist" or "oppressive."

This TNR blog post asks whether the media has been selectively covering stories with a religious angle so as to systematically discredit religion.

You're all a bunch of conformist cretins according to this retromingent retarded Eurosnob.

I went down to Captain Tony's
To get out of the heat ...

[Apologies to Jimmy and the Coral Reefers.] I went into Bobby Salazar's last Thursday and ran into Andy Emparan. I run into Andy from time to time. I dated his sister Mari - that's Marianna Gabriella Bernadette Vallejo de Emparan - back in High School and College for a time before she showed the good judgment of dumping me. Running into Andy got me thinking about Cruz Bustamante, MeCHa and how the MeCHa program might have worked out for me pretty well if things with Mari and MeCHa had turned out differently. For the reason why, follow this through to the end or reflect on Mari's very long name for a moment.

Cruz Bustamante's involvement with MeCHa has not entirely died down, although the campaign financing gaffe will probably take its place. Frankly, though, the MeCHa issue ought to, but won't, get the play it really deserves. As a proud member of the second cohort of the Baby Boom generation [post-Vietnam Battalion], I was rigorously schooled in the view that racism was the primordial sin of American culture, the sin for which there could be no forgiveness. Year in and year out, I saw the slow-learners pay the blood price of not learning that lesson. Employment termination, ridicule and re-education.

But, frankly, the only real racism I was exposed to was coming across a treasure trove of MeCHa literature while cleaning out a small residence my father owned behind our appliance repair shop in the late '70s. I was going to Fresno City College at the time, so I was about six years behind Cruz and this literature was virulently racist. It was the most nauseatingly disgusting farrago of bigotry I had ever seen, or ever would see outside of being directed to the odd Klan site for a few laughs. Now, I guess it's possible that Cruz never got near this literature since he didn't have the same access that your typical red-headed "anglo" college student would have had. I know that I never looked at college "La Raza" programs the same after that, when I had learned that "La Raza" means "the Race" and that there were those in "La Raza" who really meant it.

There are those who want to excuse MeCHa as nothing more threatening than a Quaker sodality. And probably that's true. On the other hand, no one ever suggested that Larry Rocker or Jimmy the Greek were at the head of a lynch mob when they were publicly humiliated. No one ever rationally claimed that Trent Lott truly wanted to revive the Confederacy when he was deposed. The fact is that (a) MeCHa has a paper trail that seems to crib from the wildest ambitions of Mein Kampf (see e.g., SoCal Lawblog and (b) any Republican would have been raked over the coals until he did. For those who want to excuse MeCHa and Cruz, I suggest a kind of Kantian Categorical Imperative - before you argue for Cruz, can you honestly say that you would have accepted a similar argument on behalf of a conservative Republican who had any connection with a "Eurocentric" association dedicated to "the Race."

Now, back to Mari. One of La Raza's wilder programs is the return of "Atzlan" to Mexico. Razists somehow think of this as a return of the Race's land to the Race. But that's where romantic posturing runs into historical ignorance. Did the Race really own Atzlan back when the perfidious Anglos stripped it from Mexico?

Not hardly.

Well, who did?

I don't know about the rest of "Atzlan," but Alta California was owned by the Dons, one of whom - the largest land owner in California - was General Mariano G. Vallejo who owned most of the land up near San Francisco. His wife was Francisca Benicia Carrillo, and Andy assures me that San Francisco was named for the General's wife and not for the guy from Assissi. Could be true, but that's not how I learned it in school.

Now the General lived a long life and left a lot of descendants. One of those descendants married a man named "de Emparan" which makes Andy and Mari linear descendants of the General.

In short, if MeCHa ever realized it's dream of returning Atzlan back to Mexico, then fair is fair, and the Generals' descendants should be able to make as good a claim for what the General lost as any bunch of Razists. Which is why I make it a habit to buy a round for the guy who just might have a reversionary interest in all of Northern California.

Who knows. If Cruz is elected maybe the Emparans will be needing legal representation in pressing their claim.

Internet Museum of the Unusual.

This site shows you the fun things you can do with photo editing. In some sense, the retouched photo is - well - disturbing. It's even more disturbing when you realize that the babe in the bikini plays left tackle for the Raiders.

Da Vinci Code Round-up.

Veritas has a collection of links on the Da Vinci Code.

Pax Benedictina

I'm not well enough acquainted with Dark Age history enough to appraise this interesting post which argues that monasteries following the rule of St. Benedict civilized Europe in the First Millenia. The post also argues that Africa could do with an influx of Benedictine monasteries.

Michael Kinsley may be a hypocrite, or he may be a tap-dancing parodist of the first order, but he definitely was the kind of kid who became well acquainted with "swirlies" in elementary school.

Or in whatever fancy prep school with the school blazers and ties that his smarmy demeanor clearly shows was formative in developing his character.

In any event, Arthur Silber neatly shows that Kinsley's recent view that Arnold's participation in group sex is politically significant is inconsistent with Kinsley's previous view that Clinton's use of the intern pens was politically insignificant. Silber then spends a lot of time dancing around the subject of whether Kinsley's earlier view was irony or parody. Many posts accuse Silber of dishonesty in failing to realize that Kinsley never really meant what he said about Clinton because of the various verbal escape clauses Kinsley inserts into his prose. (At which point, I lose the gist of the thread - are those critics now saying that Clinton's droit de signeur was a matter of public concern? Perhaps the critics are engaging in parody as well.)

Whatever the answer, Jonah Goldberg had Kinsley nailed in this column.

Next question, why does anyone care what Kinsley writes. He, apparently, lacks the integrity or ability to stake out a coherent, intelligible position in public discussion.

Instapundit was having a Keith Laumer nostalgia moment a few days ago. I'm having a similar moment since I'm rereading A Plague of Demons which is a part of a republication of the entire Laumer ouvre. Fun stuff.

Be careful of that Hillary Urban Legend - mostly true, but watch for the usual Clintonista straining at gnats.

Stuart Buck links to a post showing that Hillary is the "most poisoned name in History." According to the post, "Hillary" went form 136th most popular name in 1992 to sub - 1000 by 2003. This reflects the single largest drop in popularity since the Social Security Administration began charting such things. Hillary's toxicity eclipses even "Adolph's" fall from grace.

Of course, this is fun stuff, but its smells of insta-urban legend. The posts do give a reference to the SSA's baby name site. According to what I could find from this Social Security Administration page (if that link doesn't work, back into it through Buck's site) in 2001, "Hillary" was at 878. In 1992, "Hillary" was 136. So far so good. But I couldn't find information for 2002, and Hillary is still in the top 1,000. I think that someone was "gilding the lilly" on this one. Suffice it to say that Hillary's - the mercurial, vicious, political frau, that is- popularity with yuppies of child-bearing age (because who else is going to name a child "Hillary"?) is not quite as wildly popular as the Clintonista and its media lapdogs would like you to believe.

Lane Core links to a New York Times article that should be quite unsettling to those who view homosexual marriage as analogous to heterosexual marriage. It seems that some, or many, or most, gays have no use for the fidelity-based companionate model that has been the ideal since, dare we say it, Christian morality became popular in the West.

Are there some gays who long for the lifetime of faithfulness? I'd bet there are a few, but I wonder how many gays bless the fact that gay marriage has no legal status so they can avoid the legal duties and burdens that come with marriage.

New Quiz

Christian Science Monitor has this quiz to determine if you are an "isolationist," a "realist" or a "neoconservative." The CSM is not exactly the fount of objectivity. It describes neoconservatives as being committed to "Empire building." Jeepers, I've been reading Commentary for over twenty years and I haven't seen that. Maybe it's in the Yiddish language version or requires some kind of "Bible Code" reader device to decipher.

I took it and not surprisingly - given the sobriquet to the left there - I scored as a NeoConservative.

I guess I better get started on building that empire.

Yet another almost forgotten vision of future possibilities emerges from the swamp.

Like the Antarctic Ozone Hole (infra), we haven't heard much from Muammar Khaddafi in recent years. With luck, we won't be hearing much about him in the future according to one excerpt from this Telegraph article. According to the article, Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi had a conversation with Khaddafi which went as follows:

A spokesman for Mr Berlusconi said the prime minister had been telephoned recently by Col Gaddafi of Libya, who said: "I will do whatever the Americans want, because I saw what happened in Iraq, and I was afraid."

Notwithstanding the self-loathing views of the heirs of the New Left - which, I guess, is more accurately described as "other-loathing" - the world is simply a better place when America is seen as powerful and competent. During the "American Century" the greatest advances of democracy occurred after World War II and the fall of the Soviet Union. The greatest retrenchments occurred during the '70s after Vietnam. People want to be on the side of the winner and it's a good thing when America is a winner. Unless, of course, you favor the nightmare world of the early '80s when the kleptocrat heirs of mass murderers had nuclear weapons and state-sponsored terrorism was considered tres chic.

My Family Crest bears the Motto: "When in Danger and/or Doubt, Run in Circles, Scream and Shout."

In the back and forth on whether we are all doomed - doomed!! - by America's failure to ratify the Kyoto Accords, this synopsis of the scientific data verifying the Medieval Warm Period is worth reading. As any student of European history knows, the Medieval Warm Period was the period between approximately 1000 and 1300 AD when Europe was substantially warmer than it is today. During this period, the Vikings were able to colonize a substantially more hospitable Greenland. Which suggests that the warmer temperatures extended to the Arctic regions.

By the way, I haven't read anything about the Antarctic Ozone Hole in the last several years. Wasn't that thing supposed to presage the unravelling of the ozone layer and the destruction of Life As We Know It By 2003? (Unless, of course, it was just an intermittent phenomena associated with cyclical solar activity on an 11 year cycle.) I'll have to see if I can find out why the ozone layer hasn't been newsworthy for the last several years.

Hooray for Captain Spaudling has an insight into the not immediately apparent opportunities provided by undertaking a regime of physical fitness.

Mark Byron has a "Theological Musing" on the United Pentecostal Church's flirtation with Christocentric Monotheism (a term with zero historical provenance), which I'll write up as a "Sociological/historical Musing." It seems that the UPC, or some of its adherents, have a tendency to collapse the Trinity into the person of Jesus Christ and relegate the Father and the Spirit to near docetic status.

One sees in the early history of the Church a constant struggle to square monotheism with the concept of the Trinity. The earliest solutions, however, tended to minimize the divinity of Jesus vis a vis the Father. Hence, the earliest heterodoxies were things like Adoptionism - Jesus was a man who was selected or adopted by God because of his developed spiritual state; Gnosticism and Docetism - Jesus never really existed; and Arianism - Jesus may have been divine, but he was created separately from the Father and of different, lesser stuff. I can't think of any historical heterodoxy that reversed this tendency and proposed a docetic or superceded Father. Even Marcionism, which proposed an evil God of the Old Testament and a good God of the New Testament, didn't make Jesus that supercessionist divinity.

I suspect that the psychological dimension explains the UPC's tendencies. Start by emphasizing a really personal relationship with Jesus and the exclusiveness of the beliefs and emotions which are part of that relationship and it seems that you could end up with this kind of heterodox belief.

Whatever the answer, it seems like something new and something to watch develope over the next several decades.

Another evisceration of the DaVinci Code - this time by Sandra Miesel. Does Dan Brown, the author of the DaVinci Code really blame the suppression of the Knights Templar on the Vatican? How idiotic. Everyone knows that the Knights Templar were suppressed by the French Monarchy, which, among other motives, enjoyed the Templar wealth that escheated to the Crown.

Ah, well, the dumbing down of America continues.

One of my observations during the Cold War Era was that America really ought to be in the business of exporting Communism. For every country that went Communist, America received one new customer desperately in need of agricultural produce and a brand new influx of ethnic restaurants.

All that, of course, has nothing whatsoever to do with this essay by David Warren on one result of the Episcopalian Church's quest for shallow inclusiveness. And here is a brief synopsis of a debate occasioned by this event.

More on Aristotle v. Nietzsche in the 21st Century.

What kicked off the reflections on Katherine Powers below was the news that Katherine Boudin had been paroled by the unanimous vote of two parole board members after six years in prison for murder. Boudin was another of those precious 60s/70s Leftist Female activists who sought to promote agrarian revolution in French Indochina and solicitude for the working class by murdering inconvenient working class objects who got in the way of the Movement.

Boudin was a distaff member of the Weather Underground who was involved in the robbery of a Brink's truck that resulted in the murder of a Brink's guard and two police officers. Wall Street Jounal On-line has a good essay comparing Chesa Boudin and Edward O'Grady. Chesa is a Rhodes Scholar and 2003 graduate of Yale and the son of Katherine Boudin. By the strange, or perhaps not so strange, workings of fate O'Grady is a '97 graduate of Annapolis and an officer in the United States Navy. Opinion Journal offers this comparison:

In these media moments, Mr. Boudin freely dispenses instruction about what's best for the families of the three fine men murdered in the Brinks job: Sgt. Edward O'Grady, Officer Waverly Brown and security officer Peter Paige. With CNN's Paula Zahn, he said he and his mother hope that her release "can move this healing process, the reconciliation process, forward because that's ultimately the best thing for everybody."

That was no stray comment. "Bitterness and anger can really consume us," he told the suburban New York paper the Journal News. "Reconciliation and forgiveness can actually help all of us move on in a healthier, happier way." But he saved the best for the New York Times, where he likened his plight to that of the nine children left fatherless in the Brinks robbery-murders. "I also was a victim of that crime. I know how important it was for me to forgive." Mr. Boudin has said he remains committed to the ideals (minus the violence) that motivated his parents. But his remarks unwittingly reveal the hallmark of that ethos: narcissism dressed up as compassion.

Surely he comes by it honestly. With his biological parents in prison, Mr. Boudin was raised by one of their fellow Weathercouples: Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn. Mr. Ayers, you might recall, had the ill fortune of having his flip crack about his fugitive past--"I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough"--carried in the New York Times the morning of Sept. 11, 2001.

For her part, Kathy Boudin explains that it was her guilt over her privileged life and her affinity for black America that led her to that robbery. How ironic, then, that Waverly Brown, one of the two slain officers, was the first African-American on the Nyack police force. And Ms. Boudin's embarrassment about being to the manor born didn't stop her from letting her wealthy lawyer-father help arrange a clever plea bargain that today enables her to realize her freedom while others remain in prison.

Her son, meanwhile, urges those who are forever denied the kind of reunion that he will soon enjoy with his mother to "move on." But he's the one hitting the lecture circuit as an expert on parental separation. Meanwhile, the late Sgt. O'Grady's son serves his nation as a naval officer; Officer Brown's son is a captain in law enforcement and his two daughters served in the Air Force; and the other O'Gradys, Browns and Paiges live as productive members of society who decline to parade their causes or charitable works in public. In all worlds but the one Mr. Boudin apparently inhabits, simple decency would mean--especially in the wake of his mother's parole victory--leaving these people in peace.

[While we're on the subject of 70s activists and their inability to realize that people who disagree with them are ends in themselves and not merely the means to an end, don't forget Sarah Jane Olson, her too-cute fundraising cookbook and her comment that Myrna Opsahl was a bourgeousie pig who deserved to die.]

Note the similarity of the Boudin, Powers and Olson. All were raised in privilege. All conceived of their goals as trumping everything else. All sought to find meaning beyond good and evil as those ideas are conventionally understood. All have managed to perpetuate a therapeutic - "it's really all about them and how they feel " ethos either personally or through their progeny. Many of these are classical elements of Nietzsche's philosophy.

Note, also, the similarity of the children of their victims. They had the right to bitterness. They have the right to demand that their pompous victimizers just shut up and that decent society not hold fund raisers and sell cleverly named cookbooks for self-admitted murderers. And, yet, they have gone into careers that would have honored their fathers.

It is frustrating to realize that intellectual zeros like Chesa Boudin have continued to trade on the privileged status that the privileged revolutionaries that was fostered by privileged liberal society. It is frustrating to realize that the Left virtually unanimously treats people like Boudin and Olson as prophets - never condemning them, holding fundraisers for them, expressing endless understanding for them, and still valuing them as better - more idealistic - people than their victims. (Which explains Boudins early parole - she comes from good people, she meant well and she'll never do it again, etc.) And, still, Chesa and Sarah Jane Olson come across as flakes who will never cease their endless quest to find themselves. (Look at Chesa's whine about his victimization, as if the murder of O'Grady's father could ever be compared to his privileged and celebrity status.] Their unhappiness and self-loathing will push them into always looking for some movement into which they submerge their conscience. For Aristotle, in contrast, virtue really was its own reward, and with that thought we can but hope that the children of Schroeder and O'Grady will find their reward.