20:20 HINDSIGHT

From the December 2006 archives of Enjoy Every Sandwich, skippystalin’s erstwhile blog:

There has been a giant to-do over Senator Obama for the last several months. Most serious political observers feel that he is the one candidate who can actually challenge Hillary Clinton’s almost unbreakable grip on the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.

As you may have guessed, I’m not a serious political observer...

...Obama would be out of his mind to run for president right now. He’s never held executive office anywhere and has only been in the United States Senate for two years. No one that thinly credentialed has ever been elected president before. I think voters are incredibly dumb, but even I don't think they’re that dumb. And I think the senator knows that, too.

However, Obama is whip-smart, charismatic and has all the media juice a politician can hope for right now.

I had stumbled upon this three-year-old item a couple of days ago, and aside from being worth a chuckle or two, it struck me as being amazingly insightful... but in the perverse way older observations always seem when we bother to go back and exhume them. Skippy got it wrong, of course... but he got it so beautifully wrong.

“I think voters are incredibly dumb, but even I don't think they’re that dumb.”

Are you fucking kidding, Skippy? This country - the country I love, the country of my birth - has an almost infinite reservoir of dumbitude. Doubt it? Two words: Reality Television.

I can’t fault Skippy, however. Most of us are pretty fearless about writing material of a predictive nature because we know there's little chance of someone going back, digging it up, and calling “Bullshit!” on us. Nevertheless, the opportunities are there if you don’t mind a little shovelwork.

Hindsight, unlike foresight, is almost always 20:20. Alas, you cannot drive down the superhighway of life by looking in the rearview mirror: The vision may be clearer than it is through the windshield, but it does not help you avoid the obstacles in your path.

And, no, I did not watch the State of the Union address last night. Why do you ask?

THE INNER SOUL

When a candidate for public office faces the voters he does not face men of sense; he faces a mob of men whose chief distinguishing mark is the fact that they are quite incapable of weighing ideas, or even of comprehending any save the most elemental — men whose whole thinking is done in terms of emotion, and whose dominant emotion is dread of what they cannot understand. So confronted, the candidate must either bark with the pack or be lost...

All the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre — the man who can most adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum. The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people.

We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

- H. L. Mencken, writing in the Baltimore Sun, 26 July 1920

The question that comes to mind is the same one a bored child repeatedly asks during a long road trip: “Are we there yet?” I suspect that we’ve been there for some time already, and we ain’t leaving any time soon.

[A tip o’ th’ Elisson fedora to Houston Steve and his son Josh - the latter for unearthing this lovely quotation, and the former for sending it my way.]

IMMUNE SYSTEMS

There has been a Metric Buttload of attempts to understand the role of Islam in the Fort Hood massacre in the weeks since the November 5 incident. Were Major Nidal Malik Hasan’s (“alleged”) actions motivated by his Islamic beliefs, or were they the product of plain old psychosis? Was the massacre a case of a nutcase acting out, or was it jihad? And what are its future implications concerning the role of Muslims in our armed services?

Without dwelling too much on the specifics of the Hasan case, the real issue that has been thrown into sharp relief is the relationship between Islam and Western civilization, two entities that have been in more or less continuous struggle since the days of Muhammad. Does the Western proclivity for assimilation and tolerance, for multiculturalism and the embrace of The Other, contain within it the seeds of its own destruction?

Before you answer, go to Malcolm Pollack’s blog and read this thoughtful piece. Be sure to read the comments as well, consisting (mostly) of an exchange between Pollack and Kevin Kim. Then feel free to weigh in with your opinion, either here or at Malcolm’s place.

It’s not an easy question... but the ones about the Future of Civilization rarely are.

A MESS OF POTTAGE

This morning at Minyan, as is customary on Mondays, we read from the Torah, AKA the Pentateuch, AKA the Chumash, AKA the Five Books of Moses. Today’s reading told the story of Jacob and Esau, the sons of Isaac, and how Esau gave away his birthright - the claim to the greater share of his father’s estate, his by right of his being the elder brother - for what is rendered variously as “a mess of pottage” or “lentil stew.”

Esau has just come in from, presumably, a hard day of running around chasing various Tasty Beasts. We can only assume he has not had a particularly good day, since he is hungry and thirsty to the point of passing out. And there’s his brother, stirring a yummy pot of stew over the fire.

Esau: “Give me, please, some of that red, red stuff, for I am famished.”

Jacob: “First sell me your birthright.”

Esau: “What good is a birthright to me, when I’m dying [of hunger]?”

You can accuse Jacob of being a tad mercenary here, but it’s pretty clear that Esau does not place much value on that birthright. And Jacob, somehow, understands a key principle of negotiation: that the value of goods or services is always greater before they are provided. Several thousand years later, Chester Karrass would call this concept “The Callgirl Principle” in his negotiation training seminars.

But there is a lesson in this story for all of us.

How often do we pay an exaggerated price for momentary pleasure? How often do we squander our wealth on things that seem oh, so very important today - right this minute! - instead of the things that will matter to us down the road?

If a pile of money suddenly landed on you, would you buy long-term disability insurance with it, or a gold-plated heated toilet seat? Blue-chip stocks or a vacation in Maui?

Our government has been in the “selling birthrights for a bowl of stew” business for many years now. Screw the grandkids... we want pork! Right now! Never mind that that Government Cheese comes with a hefty price tag, because we won’t be the ones paying for it.

We’re all guilty of selling our birthrights, whether it be on an individual basis or as part of the Great U.S. Collective. And there will come a day when we will all realize what we no longer have... and we will know how badly we fucked up.

Hope that lentil stew tastes mighty good... but I suspect it will leave a vile taste in the back of the mouth.

Update: Was it subconscious inspiration from this morning’s reading, or just my Meat-Jones kicking in? Regardless, for the evening’s repast I prepared a red, red Mess of Pottage... but with beef and onions in lieu of lentils. And it was tasty, all right - real Birthright Trade-In Material.

FALL OF A WALL

For many of the younger people walking the planet today, it is hard to imagine that, once upon a time, a wall separated East and West.

Actually, there were many walls, most of them philosophical and political: the walls that divided the centrally planned economies and authoritarian governments of the East with the captialist, free-market economies and representative democracies of the West. But I refer to a physical wall, the wall that separated East and West Berlin.

The Wall was forbidding, surrounded by No-Man’s Land, topped by barbed wire, illuminated by searchlights, guarded by machine-gun nests. It was not built for defense or protection. It was no shield. It was, rather, like the walls of a prison... for those on the eastern side were trapped, unable to cross to the other side. Even family visits were forbidden, lest the good citizens of the East be exposed to dangerous alien ideologies.

The Berlin Wall came down twenty years ago this week... but the events that set that fall in motion started with Mikhail Gorbachev’s liberalization of Soviet communism. The glasnost and perestroika movements - latter-day attempts to create a more “human” communism - inevitably doomed it... for communism, as an economic system, can only be enforced by a heavy-handed, iron-fisted government. As the atmosphere of reform spread throughout Eastern Europe, riots and unrest struck East Germany.

I was in West Germany on October 18 1989, the day Erich Honecker - the leader of East Germany and the man who built the Wall - was forced to resign. We were on the Autobahn, enroute from Frankfurt to Worms-am-Rhein, when we heard the news on the radio. It was a little like hearing the rumble of a distant earthquake, one that would eventually swell to world-shattering proportions... reminiscent of that moment in Lord of the Rings when the evil Lord Sauron realizes, too late, that his Ring of Power is about to be tossed into the Crack of Doom and that he is well and truly fucked.

My German colleagues were ecstatic; they knew that with Honecker gone, reunification was just a matter of time. Just how little time it would take, of course, nobody could imagine.

Within two years, the Soviet Union itself would be history... and the Wall, the hated Wall, would be in the form of little chunks, all peddled to people interested in owning a piece of history.

CAMELOT IN TWILIGHT

Senator Edward “Teddy” Kennedy, the last of the Brothers of Camelot, has died at the age of 77 after his year-plus-long bout with brain cancer.

The youngest of the four sons of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr., Ted was the only one to survive past the 1960’s. Like his elder brothers, he had Presidential dreams... but any hope he may have had of succeeding to his brother John’s place in the White House was drowned in the cold waters off Chappaquiddick forty years ago last month.

Despite the ensuing scandal, he became an effective senator, beloved by his constituents and able to work both sides of the aisle. His latest - and, as yet, uncompleted - mission was to reform this country’s health care system. But Kennedy, a co-sponsor of the clusterfuck known as No Child Left Behind, had had previous experience in drafting well-intentioned but completely botched-up legislation. I’m scared to death thinking what kind of health-care reform bill may still get shoved down our throats, especially now that its passage will be seen as a memorial to Teddy.

But I didn’t write this post to badmouth the man. Plenty of other folks will be all too happy to take him to task for his excessive drinking, his philandering, his unwillingness to face the consequences of his actions.

Oops.

No, I wanted to write this as an excuse to link to the one real Teddy Kennedy story I have... about the day I sat in Teddy’s Senate seat. Literally.

Teddy, ave atque vale. No need to pack your woolens - I suspect you won’t need ’em.

Oops.

ON NEIGHBORS

Let me recommend to you this thoughtful little piece of satire by Leon de Winter. A taste:

Our neighbor, the dog, wants us to leave him alone. We can’t. His death is our ultimate ambition in life. We live in our hovel, we grow nothing in our garden, and we leave our schoolbooks on the shelf because we dream of returning to our grandfather’s house and work solely towards our neighbor’s collapse. Nothing is allowed to distract us from that.

Read the whole thing.

[Tip o’ th’ Elisson fedora to Houston Steve, who really oughta have his own blog.]

WRITER’S BLAG

The man may foam at the mouth when he writes...but boy, does he write. His take on the Blagojevich scandal, f’rinstance.

More fitty-cent words than you can shake a stick at, including the infrequently-encountered (yet oh, so evocative) “marthambles.” And I am always a sucker for the odd kidney stone reference.

Go thou and read.

A FEW POST-MORTEMS

Now that the U.S. presidential elections are over, as the winners rejoice and the losers retire to the wilderness to lick their wounds, it’s worth looking at some of the more insightful post-election posts. Here are a few:

• Skippy ponders the issue of how to get there from here. If I wrote about politics, I’d want to write as well as Skippy does. (Plus, he often posts photos of attractive ladies with big kalamatunis.)
  
  
• Oddybobo writes a thoughtful observation on A Brand New Day.
  
  
• The inimitable Velociman weighs in. (While you’re over there, read all his recent posts. Whether or not you agree with his politics, the man is a twisted genius - a southern-fried Hunter S. Thompson, only better - the kind of writer that makes the English language holler out, “Hoits so good!”)

And some completely unrelated Random Crap: Try to say “Spinach Knish” five times, real fast.

NO GOOD DEED...

...shall go unpunished.

The Evil Mermaid - that’s Starbucks, Esteemed Readers - had planned to hand out free coffee to people who came into their shops after having voted. Likewise did Krispy Kreme, doughnut purveyor to the South, plan to offer up free doughnuts to those who exercised their franchise. As did Ben & Jerry, fatboys extraordinaire, with scoops of ice cream.

Sounds good, no? An encouragement, a minor enticement, if you will, for people to worship at the altar of Democracy, without regard to party...for the doughnuts, ice cream, and coffee were offered up to all voters, be they for Donkey, Elephant, or Duck-Billed Platypus.

Alas, the Powers that Be here in Georgia raised an objection.

Apparently, there are federal laws on the books that prohibit offering any sort of enticements or remuneration for voting, and the penalties for transgressing are quite severe.

It’s pretty clear what the point of such a law would be. You don’t want people handing out hot dogs - or sawbucks - to people in an attempt to buy votes. Vote for Joe Blow and get a free hamburger! Not cricket, for obvious reasons.

But the Starbucks and Krispy Kreme programs set no test, demanded no loyalty to a specific candidate - only that one voted. Nevertheless, the State authorities made it plain: They would prosecute.

I have no idea how things eventually worked out, as I do not eat the fine products of Krispy Kreme, I do my level best to avoid those of Ben & Jerry, and I see no point in using expensive gasoline to get free coffee from the Evil Mermaid. I believe any legal issues were circumvented simply by offering the freebies to all comers. But here’s a memo to our Wise Solons. Why don’t you think about rewriting these well-intentioned laws? Encouraging people to vote is a good thing...as long as it is done without a partisan agenda.

I VOTE

Eric is a fine writer on the worst of days, but there are times when he just absolutely dead-stick nails it.

This is such a time.

Go forth and read this post, which better captures the essence of Democracy (with a capital D) than almost any other piece of writing I have ever seen.

A POX ON BOTH YOUR HOUSES

One of the best things about the arrival of Election Day tomorrow is that it means the end of the relentless campaign advertising by Georgia senatorial candidates Saxby Chambliss (the incumbent) and Jim Martin.

Virtually every commercial break on the Glass Teat features an ad for Mr. Chambliss, followed immediately by an ad for Mr. Martin. Or vice versa. And the ads on both sides are uniformly negative, packed with half-truths, misrepresentations, and outright lies.

Martin’s ads accuse Chambliss of giving tax breaks to businesses that ship jobs offshore, of supporting a new 23% tax. They don’t bother to mention that the 23% tax would replace the existing income tax.

Meanwhile, Chambliss accuses Martin of voting against sex offender legislation and for partial-birth abortion. They don’t bother to explain why the sex offender legislation was draconian and unworkable, with provisions guaranteed to drive criminals underground and off the public radar.

Why not just take it to the next level?

“Saxby Chambliss is a drooling, gaping asshole. I’m Jim Martin, and I approved this message.”

“Jim Martin is a cunt. A weeping sore on the fundament of the great State of Georgia. Plus, he has a tiny dick. I’m Saxby Chambliss, and I approved this message.”

As if the TV ads were not bad enough, the barrage of phone calls makes me want to yank my hair out by the roots...after having set fire to it. Smart, these politicos, exempting themselves from having to comply with the federal “Do Not Call” list legislation.

Well, fuck the both of you...and the horses you rode in on.

Shame on all y’all. You make me wonder why I should bother voting...and that’s the real shame.

THE PATRIOT

We’ve all seen those e-mails...the ones that trot out every tired old ultrapatriotic cliché (many of which we all agree with to some degree) in a crude attempt to whip up a certain Fervent Chauvinism.

I don’t pay attention to this sort of stuff...internet e-mails are the bane of our existence, in my not-so-humble opinion...but last week Houston Steve got one from a mutual friend and, being relatively articulate, decided to do a little fisking.

As you read the e-mail below (with Houston Steve’s interpolated responsum highlighted in italics), keep in mind that Steve leans toward the blue side of the aisle. His comments, however, make a whole lot of sense regardless of what your political leanings may be.

********************

YES, I’M A BAD AMERICAN

I Am the Liberal-Progressives’ Worst Nightmare. I am an American.

Why would that make you my nightmare?

I am a Master Mason and believe in God.

Good for you. We need hard working people in this country who have ethical precepts to live by. And no one can outsource what you do to Michigan, let alone to another country.

I ride Harley Davidson Motorcycles and believe in American products.

Buy American is obviously quite the thing to do. Remember when Wal-Mart used to pride itself on saying its products were “Made In The USA”? Guess that one went by the wayside, huh?

I believe the money I make belongs to me and my family, not some Liberal governmental functionary be it Democratic or Republican!

While I tend to agree with you, you are a citizen of this country, and there are certain functions of the government that have to be paid for. Or would you rather subscribe to a fire service and police department, and if you fail to pay your bill on time they just won’t come?

I’m in touch with my feelings and I like it that way!

Good for you.

I think owning a gun doesn’t make you a killer, it makes you a smart American.

I can’t think of a single reason to take away your guns. But I do think it’s a good idea to use them in a careful, thoughtful manner. I was so sad to hear about the 8-year-old who blew his own head off at a gun show this past weekend when his father (a physician, no less) allowed him to shoot an Uzi in full automatic. Apparently the little kid was not strong enough to control a 9mm weapon in full automatic. Who would have thought that could happen?

I think being a minority does not make you noble or victimized, and does not entitle you to anything. Get over it!

True that. But at the same time, if I have to get over it, perhaps you might get over it, too. Do you get nervous when a black man is standing on a street corner when you are stopped at a light? Do you lock your doors, when you would never do the same thing if it were a white guy? We all have our fears, and we all have to do better about living with them.

I believe that if you are selling me a Big Mac, do it in English.

Amen to that! By the way, have you ever not been able to buy a Big Mac because the counter person couldn’t talk to you?

I believe everyone has a right to pray to his or her God when and where they want to.

So you are O.K. if the Muslim laying bricks next to you stops work 5 times a day to pray?

My heroes are John Wayne, Babe Ruth, Roy Rogers, and Willie G Davidson that makes the Awesome Harley Davidson Motorcycles.

I’m glad to know you have heroes, some of whom were good Christians and others who were womanizing, wife cheating drunks. Diversity is a great thing.

I don’t hate the rich. I don’t pity the poor.

So the gospels don’t teach you a thing about reaching out and supporting the poor?

I know wrestling is fake and I don’t waste my time watching or arguing about it.

It’s fake? Say it ain’t so!!

I’ve never owned a slave, or was a slave, I haven’t burned any witches or been persecuted by the Turks and neither have you! So, shut up already.

O.K., but will you quit griping about taking away the Confederate flag? You never were a citizen of the CSA.

I believe if you don’t like the way things are here, go back to where you came from and change your own country! This is AMERICA...We like it the way it is!

Actually, America is an experiment that’s constantly changing. If you don’t like change, why don’t you go to Saudi Arabia? They’re still living in the Middle Ages.

If you were born here and don’t like it you are free to move to any Socialist country that will have you.

I want to know which church is it exactly where the Reverend Jesse Jackson preaches, where he gets his money, and why he is always part of the problem and not the solution.

And that’s why, if Obama is elected President, you probably won’t hear about Jesse very much any more. The politics of victimhood and militancy will have been finally put in their rightful place - the garbage heap.

Can I get an AMEN on that one?

Amen.

I also think the cops have the right to pull you over if you’re breaking the law, regardless of what color you are.

No argument here. What if there’s a broken tail light and the same cop wouldn’t pull over a white guy, though? Does that bother you at all?

And, no, I don’t mind having my face shown on my driver’s license.

Couldn’t agree more.

I think it’s good...And I’m proud that ‘God’ is written on my money.

Does it bother you to know that I don’t care one way or the other if His name is on my money? [President Theodore Roosevelt, for one, felt that it was disrespectful to put God’s name on money, so I guess there’s a diversity of opinion on that one. – Elisson]

I think if you are too stupid to know how a ballot works, I don’t want you deciding who should be running the most powerful nation in the world for the next four years.

I believe the president of the United States should put his hand over his heart and say the pledge of alegance (sic) and should have no reservations about wearing American flag pins on his lapel.

Well, I think if you can’t identify where all 50 states are on a map, or if you can’t tell me where Iraq and Iran and Pakistan are, you shouldn’t be voting, but guess what? Our Constitution doesn’t set that kind of a test, so we’re both out of luck. And while I don’t much care about flag lapel pins, you’re certainly entitled to your opinion. By the way, I served in the US Navy and my son was in the Peace Corps representing what was best about America in two ex-Soviet countries - what branch of service were you in, or in the alternative, what have you given back to this country you love so much?

I dislike those people standing in the intersections trying to sell me stuff or trying to guilt me into making ‘donations’ to their cause. Get a Job and do your part!

I believe that it doesn’t take a village to raise a child, it takes two parents.

I believe ‘illegal’ is illegal no matter what the lawyers think.

I believe the American flag should be the only one allowed in AMERICA!

So let me get this straight - the firemen who collect donations for the Muscular Dystrophy Association around Labor Day should give it up. And the Marines should quit with the Toys for Tots drives, right? And when you were a kid, your neighbors never kept you on the straight and narrow when your parents weren’t looking, right? And if you ever get picked up by the cops for something you didn’t do, you wouldn’t get a lawyer to protect your interests, right? Because the cops are never wrong. And if you think the American flag is the only one that counts, what the hell is the next picture [one of several in the original e-mail] supposed to be?



If this makes me a BAD American, then yes, I’m a BAD American.

If you are a BAD American too, please forward this to everyone you know.

We want our country back!

No, you’re not a Bad American. You’re just an American. Just like every other American who loves this country, but doesn’t see things exactly the way you do. If you’d quit bellyaching yourself for five minutes and listen to what is really being said, you’d find out that the people you fear the most agree with you on more issues than they disagree.

WE NEED GOD BACK IN OUR COUNTRY!

WE LIVE IN THE LAND OF THE FREE, ONLY BECAUSE OF THE BRAVE!

Sleep well my friend; my nephew, who is an Apache gunship pilot, is currently on active duty in the US Army. He won’t be voting for your candidate, but he will look out for you. It’s his job, his responsibility, and his honor. Just as it was his father’s honor to do so in Viet Nam, and it was my honor to do so in a peacetime Navy.

********************

Now, next time you get one of those e-mails, you just might be able to bring a few new perspectives to what are intended to be rhetorical questions.

UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES ALERT

Now, courtesy of the Bush administration, here’s a genuinely blockheaded piece of proposed legislation, one that has the potential of unleashing all sorts of Unintended Consequences:

The Bush administration yesterday announced plans to implement a controversial regulation designed to protect doctors, nurses and other health-care workers who object to abortion from being forced to deliver services that violate their personal beliefs.

The rule empowers federal health officials to pull funding from more than 584,000 hospitals, clinics, health plans, doctors’ offices and other entities if they do not accommodate employees who refuse to participate in care they find objectionable on personal, moral or religious grounds.

“People should not be forced to say or do things they believe are morally wrong,” Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt said. “Health-care workers should not be forced to provide services that violate their own conscience [sic].”

Like the misguided but well-intentioned No Child Left Behind legislation, this sounds ever so reasonable until you take a look at some of the implications.

It means that if a pharmacist objects to prescribing, say, RU-486 (the “morning-after pill”) based on his personal belief that its effect is tantamount to abortion, he could not be sued or punished for failing to fill a legal prescription written by a licensed physician.

It means that a Muslim cab drivers could not be punished for refusing fares from people they believe to be carrying pork or alcohol. Can’t happen, you say? It has happened... in Minneapolis.

My own position? If you’re not prepared to do the job you were hired to do, then get the hell out and let someone else do it. If you work in a hospital, you are obligated to do your job, whether that is cleaning bedpans, processing invoices, performing surgery, or dispensing medication. And determining whether a specific procedure is acceptable is outside of your job scope. That’s why we have legislatures and courts.

If you’re a cabbie from Somalia and your inclination is to turn a paying passenger away because of what may or may not be in his luggage - as if it’s any of your fucking business - for your own personal religious reasons, then get the hell back to Somalia. Or find another job.

Flipping burgers at Mickey D’s? No go. Them burgers are not halal. Sorry.

You don’t see too many orthodox Jews working as pork butchers. There’s a reason for that. If there are aspects of a job that conflict with your conscience, you get a different job. You don’t stand there and gripe, “I can’t sell this sopressata...it ain’t kosher!” and still expect to get a paycheck from Mr. Semprini.

This is a continuing pattern for Bush et al.: the failure to perform due diligence and think about the ramifications of something that is done to please a certain constituency. It’s the kind of thinking that results in Federal funds being cut off from clinics that provide information on contraception because they may also offer abortion services... resulting in more abortions rather than fewer. It’s the kind of thinking that cuts off aid to family planning services in poor countries because they don’t preach the (ineffective) gospel of “Just Say No.” It’s the triumph of ideology over science and logic.

Barack Obama scares me to death... and yet the current administration continually manages to keep me agitated about the possible consequences of another four years of Republican rule. Way to go, Dubs.

[Tip o’ th’ Elisson fedora to Mac at pesky’apostrophe for the link.]

Update: Og has a different take on the matter.

DRINKING 101

The presidents of numerous colleges and universities have joined the so-called Amethyst Initiative, releasing a statement expressing their support for lowering the legal drinking age from 21 to 18. Their rationale? Because drinking is illegal for most students, they resort to binge drinking rather than the more sensible consumption pattern of someone who is able to purchase alcohol legally.

The Amethyst Initiative, launched in July, is a coalition of college presidents who say that the legal drinking age of 21 encourages binge drinking on campuses. William Kirwan, chancellor of the University System of Maryland; William Brody, president of Johns Hopkins; C.D. Mote Jr. of the University of Maryland; and the presidents of Washington and Lee, Sweet Briar, Towson, Randolph-Macon, Duke, Tufts, Dartmouth and others have signed on to the effort.

Predictably, MADD (Mothers Against Drunk Driving) has taken the opposite position, citing the likelihood of more highway deaths should the drinking age be lowered.

When I was a young College-Age Snot-Nose, I attended school in a state (New Jersey) where the drinking age was 21. We had no problem getting alcohol and other Consciousness-Raising Substances, although we could not simply waltz into the local A&P to buy our beer. And the parties on Prospect Street, where sat the eating clubs - Princeton’s answer to the Greek fraternity system - were fueled by plenty of ethanol-bearing liquids.

At home in New York, where the drinking age was 18, I could drink legally. I developed a taste for vodka Gimlets and blended Scotch. Not at the same time, of course. [Hey - I was young, and single malts were still pretty much unknown over here in the States.] I also began learning about wine. Ripple with meat, Boone’s Farm with chicken - that sort of thing. Ya gotta start somewhere.

I had my share of Drunken Evenings, sure. But I quickly learned that imbibing to excess has Painful Aftereffects. And the kids who didn’t figure that out pretty quickly on their own went on to have problems...and Wall Street careers. It’s the phenomenon of the Learning Curve.

New Jersey lowered its drinking age to 18 right around the time I turned 20. Thanks a lot, guys, for waiting. The biggest benefit for me was the conversion of part of the Student Center to a Student Pub, where pizza and pitchers of beer were the order of the day. My ass still carries a few pounds of Student Center pizza embedded within its fleshy cheeks.

She Who Must Be Obeyed and I have discussed this issue many times over the years. The problem seems to be the national hangup with the two specific numbers 18 and 21.

If the drinking age is 21, most college students (who are under 21) will drink illegally if they drink at all. Whatever impact the larger society might want to have on the formation of healthy, reasonable attitudes toward drinking is muffled, robbed of effect. And kids being kids, they will find ways to get in trouble, especially when they are away from home’s guiding influence for the first time in their lives.

If the drinking age is 18, college students can drink legally. Problem is, there is a small cohort of high school students who can also drink legally...and serve as a supply conduit for all their younger friends. So what’s the answer?

How about...a drinking age of 19?

Most kids are out of high school by age 19, so the risk of increasing the supply of illicit alcohol into the high school environment is minimal. Or at least, not much greater than it is today. And because most college students are 19 or more, they can drink legally, as befits people who are old enough to vote...and old enough to get their asses shot off while serving their country.

Nineteen - the new twenty-one!

SCHOLARLY SECOND THOUGHTS

This is interesting:

Three Palestinians who won prestigious scholarships to study in the United States have had their American entry visas revoked after “new information” was received about them, a U.S. diplomat said on Tuesday. [Reuters]

What’s interesting is that these three were among a group of Gazan students who, back in June, had been awarded Fulbright scholarships to study in the United States. When Israel initially refused to allow the students to travel to Jerusalem for preliminary interviews with U.S. authorities - travel of Gazans into Israel is tightly restricted for obvious reasons...can you say “Hamas”? - the Washington boys applied some gentle pressure, causing Israel to back off.

The papers played it as you might expect, with the help of the amazingly evenhanded, unbiased reporting of the AP. Nasty old Israel, keeping Palestinian students from getting an education. The nerve! The chutzpah!

Now it looks like the U.S. State Department folks are having second thoughts. Wonder how much play this’ll get in the MSM?

TRUTH, LIES, AND DIPLOMACY

This past Saturday, we had the opportunity to listen to a half-hour talk by our Scholar-in-Residence, noted historian Dr. Ken Stein, director of the Institute for the Study of Modern Israel at Emory University. Stein was also the first director of the Carter Center, serving from 1983 to 1986. In late 2006, he severed his ties to the Center following the publication of Jimmy Carter’s book Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid, which Stein claimed was “...not based on unvarnished analyses; it is replete with factual errors, copied materials not cited, superficialities, glaring omissions, and simply invented segments.” A polite way of saying “Bullshit.”

Most of Dr. Stein’s discussion had to do with the increasingly left-leaning environment in modern universities - no surprise to any of us who have spent time in one - and its implications for critical thinking and a rational view of Middle Eastern events. But what I found most interesting were some of his comments toward the end of the talk, comments having to do with former President Jimmy Carter and his attempts at diplomacy in the region.

Stein is in a unique position to weigh in on Carter and his unfortunate tendency to use the Convenient Lie…because Stein, formerly a close associate of Carter, was actually present when certain diplomatic discussions were held. He cited one particular instance in which Carter had met with the late President Hafez Assad of Syria (yemach shemo). After the meeting, Carter announced that Assad had agreed to discuss the future of the Golan Heights with Israel and had indicated his willingness to create a demilitarized zone in the area.

The only problem was, this wasn’t true. Assad had never said any such thing, and Stein called Carter on it in the limousine, after exiting the talks. President Jimmy’s excuse was that the next stop was Israel, and he felt that it was important to come there with positive news…even if it wasn’t true.

In the subsequent meeting with Yitzchak Shamir and his officials, Carter told the same lie, misrepresenting Assad’s willingness to negotiate the status of the Golan. One of the officials caught Ken Stein’s eye and asked quietly, in Hebrew, whether Assad had really said this. Ken’s quiet response was “Lo nakhon” - it was false.

This exchange was overheard by Yitzchak Shamir himself, who cast his eye upon Stein and gave him a signal to indicate he had heard…and went on as though nothing had happened, not tipping Carter off that he had been caught in his lie.

Carter’s book Palestine: Peace, Not Apartheid is full of deliberate untruths, according to Stein, who claims to have kept detailed notes on every discussion for which he was present. Many times, his notes directly contradict something Carter states in the book. And in the subsequent book tours and campus visits, people were not given an opportunity to challenge the specifics of the book. As to why Carter has become such a fervent advocate of the Palestinian cause, Stein speculates that it’s a combination of his longtime role as Champion of the “Downtrodden and Oppressed” (words and emphasis mine), coupled with anger at the Jewish community, a community that supported Carter strongly in the 1976 election but deserted him in droves four years later. (The same is true of the evangelical Christian community.) So perhaps he blames the Jews for costing him the election in 1980. It’s easier, I suppose, than blaming himself or his failed presidency.

It was a fascinating discussion. It’s one thing to read about history; quite another to hear about it from someone who was right there as it was being made. Now, if we can only make sure it’s reported factually...

A CAREER IN PUBIC SERVICE

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SEPARATION

Reprising a similar event that took place 47 years ago, Mitt Romney, a contender for the GOP presidential nomination, stepped up to the lectern today to address the “issue” of his Mormon faith.

It’s a sad commentary on how little progress our country has made in half a century.

Back in 1960, John F. Kennedy came to Houston in order to defuse the concerns of southern Protestant clergymen - and, no doubt, of many Regular Citizens - that, as a practicing Catholic, he would somehow be beholden to Rome in his running the country. His speech was a brilliant defense of the principle of separation of church and state, a principle that - not incidentally - has been under particular threat by the current administration.

“I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute - where no Catholic prelate would tell the President (should he be Catholic) how to act, and no Protestant minister would tell his parishioners for whom to vote - where no church or church school is granted any public funds or political preference - and where no man is denied public office merely because his religion differs from the President who might appoint him or the people who might elect him.

“I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant nor Jewish - where no public official either requests or accepts instructions on public policy from the Pope, the National Council of Churches or any other ecclesiastical source - where no religious body seeks to impose its will directly or indirectly upon the general populace or the public acts of its officials - and where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.”

Read the whole thing.

Say what you will about Kennedy, a man who was, alas, full of human failings. Like most of us. But this was one of his Shining Oratorical Moments. Who would have the balls to use the word “ecclesiastical” in a speech today?

The separation of church and state is one of the Great Principles that has allowed this, our country, to stand as a shining City on the Hill above the benighted theocracies of Europe and the Middle East. Properly construed, it means that our government cannot - must not - favor any particular religious belief system. For government involvement in religion is a double-edged sword that is ultimately destructive of human freedom.

It also means that there is no religious test that a candidate for political office must be subject to. And with that, I wholeheartedly agree. I do not give Shit One what someone believes. I care only what that person does.

Apparently, the evangelical Protestant folk who made such a foofaraw about Kennedy’s being a Catholic all those years ago have plenty of Philosophical Brethren today. But Romney is not a Catholic. He’s a Mormon - a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints - which apparently raises the hackles of those who believe in the literal truth of the King James Bible. The same enlightened folks who believe the Catholic Church to be the “Whore of Babylon.”

These people believe that Mormons are members of some kind of cult - that they are not Christian. Well, maybe they’re not the same kind of Christian as your Happy Snake Handlers, but - hello! - if their belief system includes a divine Jesus, I’m reasonably comfortable in calling them Christians.

Of course, what do I know? I’m a Jew. To me, Catholics, Protestants (of every variegated stripe), Greek Orthodox, Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses - they’re all Christians. Whatever their differences, they all believe in a divine Messiah in the person of one Jesus of Nazareth.

How important those differences are all depends on your point of view. Three years ago, I wrote about a long-ago incident in which a Japanese colleague asked me what our family’s holiday plans were: “Elisson-san, what will your family be doing for Christmas?”

[Actually, this sounded more like “Erisson-san, what wirr your famiry be doing for Kurisumasu?” But the meaning was plenty clear enough.]

And I answered, “Not a whole lot. We are Jewish, and we do not celebrate Christmas.”

My colleague considered this for a moment, and replied, “Oh, that’s OK. All you Western religions are the same to us.”

So to me, a Jew, the spectacle of evangelical Protestants being worried that Mitt Romney isn’t a “real Christian” is just plain fucking ridiculous.

And if he weren’t? Remember what JFK said at the Rice Hotel 47 years ago. It was true then. It’s just as true now.

If you like Mitt Romney’s stated positions on the issues, then vote for him. Otherwise, don’t. But this religious Red Herring? Just remember...after a couple of days, herring begins to stink.

ON ROADSTERS AND IRRELEVANT INSTITUTIONS

Houston Steve gave me a lift to the Sommelier Guild event yesterday evening. It was a pleasant enough drive: the sun was shining, the sky was blue with a few puffy cumulus adrift, and the day’s warmth was beginning to diminish with the approaching dusk.

Besides all that, we were in Houston Steve’s sporty little Honda S2000. It’s a sweet ride.

Both of us suffered a pang of envy as we passed a guy driving a vintage Austin-Healey. Now, that is a roadster. Temperamental and expensive, it’s nevertheless the picture of the British sports car, with a grille that almost appears to be grinning at you, fairly dripping with Poon-Attractant. I reminisced about my Snot-Nose Days, when one of our neighbors had purchased one. I still remember the awe with which we, the neighborhood Rug-Rats, gazed upon that car. As young as we were, we all knew that there was one hot little car.


Austin-Healey 3000 Mk II, 1962 model. Hoo, boy.

On the way, we talked - among many things - about the day’s events, which included Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to the U.N. By doing so, we risked spoiling our appetites...but we took that chance.

Ahh, the United Nations. It’s pretty much an irrelevant institution, given that every tinhorn idiot strongman with a country has a voice in the General Assembly. Viz: Mr. Ahmadinejad.

It’s useful to remember that the United Nations has several components. In addition to the General Assembly, there are the Security Council, the Economic and Social Council (including the IMF and the World Bank), the Secretariat, and the International Court of Justice. And, as Steve pointed out, some of those components are more useless than others.

The Security Council, with five permanent members (The United States, the U.K., France, Russia, and China) plus ten other members holding temporary seats. It’s really the part that matters, with the power to make decisions that member governments must carry out under the United Nations Charter. Given that the permanent members hold veto power and that there are typically no real consequences for violating resolutions, the Security Council never seems to be able to act decisively. Probably a good thing, on balance.

George Bush would love to see Japan added to the Security Council as a new permanent member, but it’s doubtful this will ever happen. India would be a much more likely candidate for an expanded Permanent Member roster, being the most populous democracy in the world. We’ll see what happens.

And then you have the General Assembly, composed of 192 member states as of this writing. With each state, no matter how thinly populated or stupidly governed, having the same one vote, it’s easy to see how useless this organization can become. Since resolutions of the General Assembly aren’t binding on the member states, it’s mostly a harmless echo chamber. “What about restricting membership to states with a democratically elected form of government?” I suggested. Steve responded that there would be little purpose in having a United Democratic Nations in which everybody would pretty much agree with one another...and I had to concede that he had a point.

The U.N. Human Rights Council? Now, there’s a joke for you. Never mind that the membership includes a number of states with (ahem) less-than-stellar human rights records - Cuba and Saudi Arabia leap to mind - the real joke is that only resolutions condemning Israel ever seem to emanate from the Council. That’s right: the only country in the Middle East offering any semblance of human rights. Never a single word about, say, North Korea. Or Afghanistan under the Taliban. Or Sudan. What a bunch of fucking hypocrites.

Houston Steve may have said it best. With the United Nations, as with any other prophylactic, the only way to test its effectiveness is to count its failures.