ha more Kristol

Speaking of Bill Kristol's epic performance, A Tiny Revolution has an excellent three part feature on it.

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Why do they hate us????!

So many are just utterly incapable of understanding that some people have legitimate objections to the actions of the US Government, which then motivate the aggrieved to illegitimate actions. A Tiny Revolution highlights a perfect example. I'd describe it as hilarious but the fact that it is really fucking serious would make me feel bad about laughing. I need a word for that situation, because I'd use it a lot.

edit - I should note that Israel is involved in the linked case, but they're a US client state so they can be lumped in for these purposes. Also, racism or some other form of bigotry that allows us to think of some groups as subhuman contributes to this and other cases.

Laws don't apply here, that's why we're the best

Greenwald today sums up just how pathetic things are here in Obama's "last, best hope of Earth."

The president and numerous government officers have been accused, with overwhelming evidence in support, of illegally spying on their own citizens. Congress responds by passing laws to make more spying legal, and retroactively immunize the lawbreakers. The Supreme Court refuses to hear the case, despite the ruling of two lower-court judges that the spying was illegal.

A war-mongering supreme leader, his cronies in supposedly coequal branches of government, and his corporate conspirators have announced that the rule of law does not apply to them. Despite public outcry, nothing has or will ever happen to seriously investigate their crimes. They are untouchable and unaccountable.

If this shit happened in Russia or China, all the conservative blow-hards and liberal enablers would be denouncing it at the top of their lungs. But applying the same standard to America that we apply to the rest of the world is unthinkable.

The epic depravity of Bill Kristol

I've mentioned before my disdain for Bill Kristol, though I really can't summon up strong enough words to fully express my opinion of the man. He's the sniveling, scoffing, sneering face of the cancer eating away at the world, wrong about everything as he licks the boots of power, endlessly rewarded by the pathetic corporate media who amplify his combination of astonishing ignorance and blatant lies. TomDispatch has a good piece up about one of Kristol's most epic performances.

tell me

What would happen if, upon my attempted reentry to the good ol' Yew-Ess of Ay, I refused the border Nazi's demand to open my trunk for his random inspection? I genuinely have no idea. As a citizen do I have rights in this situation? What would happen if I just asked him if I'm allowed to refuse? I assume I'd then be subject to an anal cavity search, as punishment for my insolence.

Anyway, more on the trip later. Generally, it was good. Very, very good.

gone til Monday

to Canada!

Why? Why? Be more constructive with your feedback!

I've repeatedly heard from my family that part of what makes Hillary Clinton so terrifying is that she's a socialist.

A SOCIALIST!!

Now I agree that Hillary Clinton is terrifying, though really no more so than any of the other sociopaths contending for the most powerful job in the history of humanity, but I'd never identify a desire for wealth and production to be distributed more in line with popular interests as her most glaring flaw. In fact I have a hard time attributing that characteristic to her at all. I can't imagine that an objective assessment of her positions and voting history, compared to that of any of the other presidential contenders, or compared to just the Democratic field, or hell even just to Obama, would find her to be the most socialist. And I can't imagine any meaningful reason to label her candidacy as a socialist one, overall. She's conservative on economic issues, hawkish on foreign policy, and authoritarian on domestic policy, though slightly less so than the ultra-lunatic incumbents. In the parlance of our time...

SOCIALIST!!

So, evil she-devil aside, what is so overwhelmingly wrong with socialism anyway? They never have a good answer to that question though that doesn't slow them down. They end up muttering something about how all the people from socialist countries are trying to move here for our medicine. (Huh?) Or how socialism basically just makes the whole government a huge corporation that inevitably collapses. (Isn't that what is happening here?) Their heads are full of nonsensical cartoons of history and political theory, but they know that sure as the sweet baby Jesus was born of a virgin, socialism is really fucking bad.

How did this instantaneous and intense negative association come to be? Noam Chomsky explains:

One notable doctrine of Soviet propaganda is that the elimination by Lenin and Trotsky of any vestige of control over production by producers and of popular involvement in determining social policy constitutes a triumph of socialism. The purpose of this exercise in Newspeak is to exploit the moral appeal of the ideals that were being successfully demolished. Western propaganda leaped to the same opportunity, identifying the dismantling of socialist forms as the establishment of socialism, so as to undermine left-libertarian ideals by associating them with the practices of the grim Red bureaucracy. To this day, both systems of propaganda adopt the terminology, for their different purposes. When both major world systems of propaganda are in accord, it is unusually difficult for the individual to escape their tentacles. The blow to freedom and democracy throughout the world has been immense.

Government says online poker is a national security matter

Seriously, how pathetic can our government get?

Americans, according to this administration, have no right to know how many billions of our tax dollars they've spent with no legislative authorization whatsoever in order to buy the cooperation of other nations and allow them to continue to violate the rights of American adults by preventing them from gambling in the privacy of their own home.

The new guy

Horace got a clean bill of health from the vet, and so at least for now he's living with us. He spent the first few days closed off in our spare bedroom, but we introduced him to the other cats and they all get along so the whole house is open now. I haven't captured it on camera yet, but he does this very cute submissive routine with them where he rolls onto his back and reaches out to them with his front paws.

He is still quite afraid of people, running away in terror if we come near him, but he seems to forget his fear at meal times so we think he's making progress. His body language is slowly becoming more confident and while he spends almost all of his time hiding, he's spending more time in the hiding spots closer to people. When he was confined, we were able to scratch his head and neck a bit, but now that he has open space, he just runs away if we reach towards him, so we've stopped trying to initiate contact. We figure he'll see the other boys enjoying it and eventually come give it a try.

Now that he's part of the family, we've considered changing his name. "Horace" sounds too much like "Hattori" and isn't even a Japanese character from a movie. The problem is that we've been calling him Horace ever since we first saw him running around outside back in August, so it is really hard to change direction. We tried switching to "Wallace," figuring it would be easier to switch to a name that sounded similar to what we've been calling him, and that it could be a tribute to Alfred Wallace. (Or Rasheed.) But the best I've been able to do is call him "Horace Wallace" which is unbearable.

In summary, he meows when he uses the litter box, which is convenient as an early warning stink alarm.

on the fine tradition of virgins having babies

I recently read Christopher Hitchens' God Is Not Great and particularly enjoyed this passage, in response to a gospel account of how Mary "was found with child of the Holy Ghost."

Yes, and the Greek demigod Perseus was born when the god Jupiter visited the virgin Danae as a shower of gold and got her with child. The god Buddha was born through an opening in his mother's flank. Catlicus the serpent-skirted caught a little ball of feathers from the sky and hid it in her bosom, and the Aztec god Huitzilopochtli was thus conceived. The virgin Nana took a pomegranate from the tree watered by the blood of the slain Agdestris, and laid it in her bosom, and gave birth to the god Attis. The virgin daughter of a Mongol king awoke one night and found herself bathed in a great light, which caused her to give birth to Genghis Khan. Krishna was born of the virgin Devaka. Horus was born of the the virgin Isis. Mercury was born of the virgin Maia. Romulus was born of the virgin Rhea Silvia. For some reason, many religions force themselves to think of the birth canal as a one-way street.

I sometimes wonder how many people who claim to believe that Jesus was born of a virgin genuinely believe that 2,000 years ago an actual human being was born whose conception didn't involve human sperm. The notion is obviously preposterous, and even the most devout Christians must have a hard time hiding behind "the mystery of faith" as their cheap cover. If those people were then exposed to the stories of all these other mythological asexual reproductive events, wouldn't that make it even harder for them not to see their beloved miraculous conception as a silly fairy tale like all the others? Knowledge is the enemy of faith.

[I couldn't resist including the last line of the quote. It would be an excellent introduction to a discussion of control over female sexuality, a topic I might revisit in another post.]

Infinite Hypocrisy

Just consider the consequences if the privileged and powerful were willing to entertain for a moment the principle of universality.

So begins what I think is the first Noam Chomsky passage I ever highlighted in one of his books, the first of many. Elsewhere he's called the principle of universality a "moral truism that should not provoke controversy," defining it as "We should apply to ourselves the same standards we apply to others - in fact, more stringent ones." In Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy, he continues [emphasis in original]:

If the United States has the right of "anticipatory self-defense" against terror, or against those it thinks might attack first, then, a fortiori, Cuba, Nicaragua, and a host of others have long been entitled to carry out terrorist acts within the United States because of its involvement in very serious attacks against them, often uncontroversial. Surely Iran would also be entitled to do so in the face of serious threats that are openly advertised. Such conclusions are, of course, utterly outrageous, and advocated by no one.

He goes on to highlight two other historical instances where by "US and UK standards," attacks commonly regarded as atrocities should be seen as "legitimate anticipatory self defense." The Taliban and Osama bin Laden had reason to believe the US was planning military action against them, making the 9/11/2001 attacks " a pre-emptive strike in response to what he saw as US threats."

An even stronger case is the Japanese attacks on Pearl Harbor and the Philippines in World War 2, preceded by well publicized US plans to (as expressed by an air force general) "burn out the industrial heart of the Empire with fire-bomb attacks on the teeming bamboo ant heaps of Honshu and Kyushu," and slaughter civilians.

All of this provides far more powerful justification for anticipatory self-defense than anything conjured up by Bush, Blair, and their associates. There is no need to spell out what would plainly be implied, if elementary moral principles could be entertained.

Indeed.

My personal statement for grad school applications

Here are the opening sections of the personal statement I attached with my graduate school applications. Below this would be a customized paragraph expressing interest in the work of specific faculty members at each school, and sections about my academic, research, and other experiences.

In this personal statement I essentially want to summarize where I am and how I got here. Along the way I will discuss my research interests, career goals, and relevant experiences.


Worldview

My views include the following ideas:

• The foreign policy of the United States Government has been grossly immoral for at least 100 years. Many of its executive branch and military leaders during this time should be considered war criminals, with Congressional leaders of both parties fully complicit.
• Increasingly authoritarian domestic policies have eroded personal liberty in a multitude of ways, and are contrary to our supposed national ideals.
• The vast majority of our national dialog on these and related matters is remarkably ill-informed, predicated on false assumptions, and dominated by people with an interest in keeping it that way.
• The American lifestyle is perilously unsustainable and unhealthy. Our transportation, energy, and agricultural systems depend on unsustainable resource consumption and environmental destruction. Our economy is propped up by unsustainable debt levels. Our high-calorie diets and sedentary lifestyles are leading to deteriorating health while our healthcare system becomes increasingly unaffordable.
• Religion is a negative societal force. Its destructive consequences include the following: encouraging pride in scientific illiteracy and historical ignorance; glorifying sexist, racist, and homophobic ideas and actions; inhibiting compassion and stunting our moral reasoning abilities in favor of punishment and deference to authority.

These views are based on a great deal of reading and reflection, but each point would take far more space to adequately defend than I have available in this format. So I present them as an unsubstantiated list of my personal views, for which I believe I could argue convincingly and passionately, though I always consider myself open to intelligent counterargument.

Taking all of those views together, I find the hypocrisy, injustice, and immorality disturbing, almost indescribably so. I see understanding the thoughts and behaviors behind each of those points as a necessary contribution to fighting them, and I find myself driven to pursue this understanding.


Academic, Career, and Faculty Interests

I want to understand how individuals can hold obviously contradictory beliefs. Why do people have strong opinions on subjects about which they know almost nothing? I want to understand how each individual within a population can assume patterns of behavior that seem so obviously self-destructive to the group as a whole. How can people come to value superstition and dogma over logic and evidence? What forces drive these behaviors?

I’ve invested a lot of time and energy in trying to make sense of these things, and I’ve concluded that an academic career in psychology would be the best avenue for continuing this pursuit. I envision myself as beginning an academic career with a unifying theme of studying conditions that encourage or discourage reasonable behavior, drawing on findings from, and contributing to the body of knowledge in the fields of personality/social psychology and evolutionary psychology.

My interest in those particular fields developed because they’ve offered the most compelling insights for me as I’ve explored those questions. The classic social science experiments – Milgram, Stanford Prison – shed valuable light on Abu Ghraib and our national torture debate (I still can’t get over that there is any debate). I’ve found the personality research of Dr. Robert Altemeyer of the University of Manitoba, who has extensively studied authoritarianism and religious attitudes, similarly illuminating. Evolutionary Psychology offers the insight that many of the disturbing problems I listed could be united by a common theme of human confrontation with evolutionarily unprecedented situations: huge states, agriculture, powerful weaponry, hydrocarbon energy, and advanced scientific knowledge. The vast majority of the evolution of the human mind occurred in the absence of these innovations, and thrusting our stone age brains into the space age seems bound to cause trouble.

I’ve given political issues a prominent place in this essay because they arouse my passions these days, but I’ve touched on other areas as well: education, morality, health, religion, media consumption. There are a number of kinds of behavior that interest me under all of those headings. I hope to have the opportunity to explore one or more of those interests as a graduate student and beyond.

visiting grad school

When I applied to grad schools this time, I had no idea what to expect. I'm fairly confident in my ability, but wasn't sure if I'd be a good candidate on paper. I was just hoping I'd get into at least one school.

This weekend I'll be visiting McMaster University, for a prospective student weekend with the Department of Psychology, Neuroscience, and Behavior. I'm excited for the visit, and I'm optimistic that the invitation (and especially their willingness to pay for my travel and lodging) is an indication that they'll be likely offer me acceptance and funding. They're the first program I've heard back from, so now I'm imagining a scenario where I get into a few schools and have options. But that's getting ahead of myself.

McMaster's program is different than the others to which I applied, with their focus on examining human behavior from a biological perspective, which I'm calling evolutionary psychology. Faculty members Martin Daly and Margo Wilson are very prominent researchers in this field (though unfortunately for me, they're not accepting grad students). The opportunity to study and possibly collaborate with them would be quite appealing. Evolutionary Psychology seems to be rather controversial, and while I have a gut feeling that this means it is onto something, I should consider the option of focusing on a more conventional research area as a student. I doubt that would actually be a decisive factor, but I do want to try to understand more fully that element of controversy.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to meeting faculty and getting a feel for the department. I like the idea of coming into this kind of setting as an outsider, with no real psychology background. Reading through the course curriculum, I feel a genuine enthusiasm for learning about those topics. Aside from learning more about all that stuff, I'm hoping I'll get a tour of their facilities and see all the cool toys and whatnot. Meanwhile Kira will be checking out the town, investigating local housing options and potential employers for her. This will be my first visit to Canada, so that will be cool too.

This is an exciting time, and I hope that I'll find myself in a good situation next fall, whether it is McMaster or another program. If anyone has suggestions about the kinds of questions I should be asking, please let me know.

blog identity crisis... averted?

I haven't been doing much blogging lately, and I think a big reason is that I'm not really sure what this blog is supposed to be anymore. That sounds weird because I created it and I'm the only one who writes it, so it can be anything I want it to be. But I don't know what I want it to be. Maybe this has just run its course.

Who am I writing for? I have a handful of people that I know read this, and I get a few dozen random google hits every day. I have a couple of sponsors that give me a small but not insignificant revenue stream. But what I am doing here?

Blah.

Ok, so I saw this graph, and I thought it was interesting. First of all you have to understand the tool. It uses a two-dimensional political spectrum (economic issues on the x and social issues on the y) to plot the political sentiments of people or groups. You can take a test to see where you'd fit on the graph, and the creators of the site have done research to estimate where various politicians from around the world would fall.

The graph shows something I already know, that prominent US Presidential candidates represent an extremely narrow spectrum of right-wing authoritarian policy positions. Since I'm in the far bottom left, I'm completely alienated. Many of the people who criticize the current administration and its supporters are then supporting a party that is almost the exact same, with a few tiny differences (differences that admittedly in some situations can make a difference to real people - the point is that the ideology isn't very different). And then when a guy like Nader comes along, they hate him and vilify him, and totally miss the irony of it all.

Now I already understood that, but I have no idea how well anybody else understands this whole situation. Or if they care. Or if they'd be able to make sense of the graph. Or if they'd care to. I think it is a useful tool, but will anyone else? More specifically, should I put it on my blog? Why?

That's just one example and there are a hundred more. I guess whenever I have these blog identities crises I should just remember that I'm doing this for myself. I should approach it like a personal journal that I'm sharing with anyone who is interested. I should just write about the things I want to write about. I guess this means recording ideas and events that I'd want to look back on. I did that recently with my series of "grad school?" posts because I've got something going on with grad school choices (more on that in another post maybe). It was helpful. I could extend the same logic to political thoughts, and personal events (a.k.a. what's up with my cats), and whatever else.

So I guess I hereby resolve to drop the formality and the second-guessing about what my audience wants to read and I'll just write what I think makes sense to write. I'll try to label the post title very literally, to at least give you some chance to skip the boring shit.

So that means getting away from just posting a link and a line of commentary that is clearly intended to share with others. I wonder if I'll really do that.

I live among football Gods

Apparently every football every used in every Superbowl was made in that Wilson factory I jog past. Sweet.

who's #1? See For Yourself, biotch

#1

loss of diversity because of modern agribusiness

Thanks to Walt for passing it along.

chime in

I'm having an interesting discussion in the comments of this post. The author is defending a criticism that Richard Dawkins and other atheists (who I've taken to mean Dennett, Harris, and Hitchens) are "incurious" and otherwise unserious about examining religion's root causes before they dismiss it. He's also claimed that they ignore any position effects of religion. I've generally argued that the first claim is incorrect but rather irrelevant, and that the second is just wrong. Along the way I've defended evolutionary psychology and memetics against his derision.

Go see if what I've said makes sense.

Poor Horace

Horace has been in our bathroom for a week now and we're disappointed with his slow progress. He's very afraid of people, and doesn't seem to be warming up much to us. I found an excellent essay about what is involved in taming an adult feral cat, and we now realize it is going to be a lot harder than with the younger kitten we tamed in December. Cats need positive exposure to humans at a young age, otherwise they tend to be extremely distrustful of people.

He just hides in a cubby in the bathroom and generally seems miserable. He does eat the food we give him, use a litter box, and move around the bathroom when we aren't there. He'll let us rub his head sometimes, but rarely seems to enjoy it; he obviously just wants us to leave him alone. He doesn't seem to mind if we're in the room, but when we look directly at him or move near him, that's when he shrinks away or even hisses. If we try to move things around in his cubby, he panics.

We're taking him to the vet soon, which should be an ordeal. If he's healthy enough, we're going to keep him for a while and try to socialize him. We'll get him neutered and immunized and then give him some space. We'll keep hanging out where he can watch us, but stop pushing him to accept our physical contact and let him adapt at his own pace over several months. Eventually he'll meet our cats. Apparently feral cats learn a lot about how to interact with human from watching housecats, so it will be nice if we can find a safe way for that to happen.

Temperatures here have been in single digits at night and in the teens and 20s during the daytime, so I know he's better off being scared but warm and well fed in our bathroom than hungry and freezing out there.

votes, terrorists, criminals

Today I'd like to offer you three links of essential reading. All three issues are straightforward examinations and interpretations of incontestable reality, and yet all would likely be immediately dismissed as extremist hysterics by most everyone I know. People who genuinely prioritize truth and morality are rare.

1.) At Harper's, Scott Horton has Six Questions for Mark Crispin Miller. The discussion is about how election fraud, and the media's failure to report on it except derisively is an ongoing scandal that undermines our (already thin claim to) democracy. I'd note that while Republicans are overwhelmingly the perpetrators and direct beneficiaries of these dirty tricks, Democrats have done very little to oppose them. For me the most shocking example of Donkle capitulation is Al Gore's blocking the attempts of few Democrats from the House of Representatives to contest the 2000 Presidential election, and every single Senate Democrat siding with Gore.

2.) Chris Floyd discusses the bloody doings of "the most dangerous terrorist organization at work in the world since the Second World War," the United States Central Intelligence Agency. Your tax dollars pay for an unaccountable Presidential army that has "overthrown governments, sponsored wars, carried out assassinations and terrorist attacks, organized and financed death squads, kidnapped and tortured, trafficked in drugs, bribed and blackmailed, even worked with the Mafia." If America was even the least bit serious about fighting world terrorism, it would take Chalmers Johnson's advice and abolish the CIA.

3.) Winter Patriot makes the point that needs to be made every single day. George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Condoleeza Rice, Donald Rumsfeld, Colin Powell, Paul Wolfowitz, Ari Fleischer, and Scott McClellan "by any civilized standard... are obviously guilty of mass murder, war crimes, and crimes against humanity." I don't share his hope that they all be tortured to death in front of a worldwide audience of billions (life in prison in the strictest sentence my conscience can allow to even the most vile criminal, a category to which all of them clearly belong), but I do share the outrage behind the sentiment. And I also share his frustration that nothing will ever happen about it.

collaborate, learn about justice

Great post over at The Primate Diaries. He recommends Chomsky and Zinn, two authors and activists I've praised here many times, along with many other people and organizations.

He provides some links to excellent resources to learn about them. I've felt like my internet reading routine is getting kind of stagnant, so I'm looking forward to exploring these. Now that I'm grooving on anarchy, I'd been meaning to read some Emma Goldman, so I'm particularly excited to learn more about her. My wife has been talking about Che Guevara recently, so we'll have to dig into that too.

I added a comment that sustainable agriculture is a topic that fits well into the social justice discussion. Check out his list and add your own ideas in the comments!

YES!

We just got this guy to come inside and now he's chilling in the bathroom. He was really hard to get to come near us, but I think winter and loneliness have caught up to him. He's been crying at our door the last few nights. We call him Horace, after another cat we know that he reminds us of. In a few days we'll take him to the shelter (hopefully after cutting off that thing matted into his hair). Hopefully he's not sick...

YouChomsky

I've been spending time in between my reading binge watching Noam Chomsky videos on yewtewb. This man is a treasure, and the amount of free material instantly available to you is incredible. (Many are audio tracks with still pictures added.) Make an hour some time and watch this 6-part series, or any of the many shorter items available.

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Cat Rescue Updates

Kira has the story.

We were very sad to learn that "Big Boy" had contagious feline leukemia and was killed. That disease is contagious and he would have required an unrealistic level of care, so I'm reluctantly conceding that euthanasia was probably justified in his case. I really liked that guy though, and he would have made an awesome pet if someone had taken care of him before he got sick.

The good news is that 3 of the 4 other cats we've taken in have now been adopted, including the fraidy cat. The last one left is the one I thought was most likely to be adopted, the adorable little kitten. We're pretty sure that both of those guys were Big Boy's sons, so he has left quite a legacy.

so many books (so much time)

I realized today I'm in the middle of these 7 books right now:

Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies

A collection of 5 Chomsky essays. I've read one so far, and it was excellent, as he always is. The interesting thing about this volume is that it has 5 appendices of supplemental material, one for each essay, whose combined length is longer than the main text. I haven't decided if I should read each appendix as I read its corresponding chapter, or just read it all in a row.

Teaching As a Subversive Activity

Originally published in 1969, about a philosophy of teaching and criticism of the existing school structures. I've read the first chapter and found myself vigorously nodding my head in agreement.

Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq

I'm about a quarter of the way into this scathing critical analysis of the execution of the Iraq invasion and occupation. To an extent, I think this subject is unnecessary, since I'd contend we had no justification for invasion regardless of how ineptly things were planned and managed. But the book seems very well researched and written, and offers a great deal of information that supports my position regardless of the author's intention or views. It also provides insights into the minds of various government and military figures, which is interesting for me, given my interest in political psychology.

The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution

Richard Dawkins writing about evolution is always delightful. I'm about halfway through. The book has a very cool premise: start with humans, and go back in time meeting each common ancestor along our evolutionary family tree all the way back to the origins of life. So I've met all the apes, and then monkeys, other primates, etc. He structures the book in the fashion of The Canterbury Tales. A very cool idea for a book, and very good reading.

1984 (Signet Classics)

I started this classic work of fiction a while ago, but haven't touched it for a long time because I can just read the news and get the real thing. Orwell was truly a genius.

Unexceptional: America's Empire in the Persian Gulf, 1941-2007

I met the author at a lecture and he sent me an advance copy of his book. I've read most of his concluding chapter, which he said he originally planned to read as part of the lecture (but changed his approach to fit the audience). I'm not sure if I'll end up reading the whole thing, since I feel like I already know most of the material on a basic level, and might not be especially interested in learning it in more detail.

God Is Not Great

The Christopher Hitchens polemic, subtitled "How Religion poisons everything." I read the first few pages last night because I was excited when it arrived in the mail. I anticipated it would be lighter reading for me, but I found Hitchens' style to be more dense than I expected (I've never read a book of his before). So I might pretend I never started it and move this into the next group of books.

The next group includes at least these 5 on my reading pile:

What We Say Goes: Conversations on U.S. Power in a Changing World

In Our Image: America's Empire in the Philippines

Les Misérables (Signet Classics)

A Power Governments Cannot Suppress

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto

I'm declaring a reading binge, to begin immediately. How long until I finish all 12? Does the end of February seem realistic?

do they say anything else?

could Dick Cheney have brain damage?

I imagine many of you have seen the old clip of Cheney from 1994:



The video above attributes Cheney's inconsistency to financial interests. Maybe.

I just started reading Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq which in passing raises another possibility. After discussing how Cheney, before the run-up to the Iraq invasion in 2003, had always seemed like "a realist" who "demanded the hard facts" and was "very practical," Ricks writes "Cheney had changed... perhaps because of his heart ailments, which can alter a person's personality."

This immediately made me think of Phineas Gage, whose personality drastically changed after a railroad spike accidentally was driven through his frontal lobe. He became obstinate, abusive, and profane. Since then science has come to understand that region of the brain to be important for judgment and impulse control.

I wonder if heart attacks could cause minor frontal lobe damage? Could Dick Cheney literally have brain damage? Not to the extent of Gage's obviously, but enough to make him more aggressive, less reasonable, and more profane? This is the guy who told Senator Leahy "go fuck yourself."

This is obviously pure speculation on my part, but it struck me as odd that I'd never seen this idea anywhere else.

assortments

I jogged around the neighborhood in shorts today. In Ohio. In January.

I'm sending off my 4th and final graduate application today. I have no idea if I'll get in to any of these programs.

I haven't eaten meat in 4 days.

I haven't seen a stray cat near my house since I've been back from Maryland. They must know we're the people who disappear felines.

the story of stuff

watch, then do something

belgian beer value alert (updated)

Trader Joe's 2007 Vintage Ale is now available, which I've never had, but it is brewed by Unibroue and costs $4.99 for a 750ml bottle, which seems like a great value for anything from that brewery. I'll try it soon to let you know if you should rush out and stock up.

I'm just looking out for you.

UPDATE: Delicious. It is a dark brown Belgian-style Dubbel Ale, very spicy and sweet, and smoother than you'd expect from a 9% ABV offering. Great value for $5.

a nice church story (seriously)

This is a pretty cool story, about a preacher (with the awesome name of The Reverend Hamilton Coe Throckmorton) who did something of an experiment with his congregation, based on a biblical parable. He gave everyone $50, and asked them to use their talents double it and donate the profit to charity. They made about $40,000.

The money raised really wasn't "profit" in the business sense. While many people did produce goods and services of value, it sounds like ultimately most of the funds raised came from within the congregation, so I think of it as more a success of charity than business, not that that's a bad thing. The article emphasizes what I see as the real value of the project: bringing the community together, giving people a reason to use their talents and creativity, and providing an opportunity to enjoy life.

When I argue that religion is a bad thing for society, I am often misunderstood to be saying that nothing good comes of religion, which is definitely not my point. One of the best things that organized religion offers people is a sense of community. Charity is also commonly associated with religion, and it is possible that religious people generally are more charitable (there are some popular studies of this subject that seem inconclusive). I would argue that religion is unnecessary for either of those things, and I'd similarly argue that the success of the $50 project had little to do with religion. Helping others and enjoying community is a natural thing, and religion can be a unifying factor, but it also causes a lot of other damage.

When I argue that religion is a net negative, it is because I'm unwilling to attribute the success of Rev. Throckmorton's idea to an irrational belief in a supernatural deity who hates gay people and will condemn you to an eternity of suffering if you cross him; I attribute that success to the basic goodness of people.

"I will not pay my income tax if we go to war with Iran. I realize this is a desperate and perhaps futile gesture..."


hmmm

consume the terror

How is it possible that I've eaten the #1 most terrifying food in the world, a food more terrifying than #5, which is illegal and causes bloody diarrhea, or #4 which is a drink with dead baby mice as a featured ingredient?

I call bullshit on this list and on paulp's tumblog that led me to it.

nice

good shit

no rights for godless parents

1970

now

yay God!!

je t'accuse

Sara at Orcinus makes a good point, which is that you can learn a lot about what someone thinks by listening to what they accuse their opponents of:

When conservatives tell us that we need constant surveillance to make us secure, what they're telling us is that they themselves are prone to criminal behavior if they think nobody else is watching. The fear of exposure is the only force keeping them on the right side of the law -- and that's why it's the only form of "security" they understand. Bear this in mind if you decide to do business with them.

When they tell us that our future depends on supporting a military that's bigger than the rest of the world's fighting forces combined, what they're telling us is that they can't handle chaos, complexity, change, or being out of control. The whole world is a threat; the only solution is a bigger gun. Bear this in mind if you find yourself in conflict with them.

When they tell us diplomacy isn't an option, they're telling us that it's not an option they understand. Words, agreements, treaties, and contracts mean nothing to them. Brute force is the only option they comprehend...or are likely to respond to themselves. Bear this in mind before you negotiate with them.

When they tell us that homosexuality is a threat to American families, what they're telling us is that homosexuality is a threat to their families. As in: if they ever dared to admit their own sexual interest in other men, their wives would leave them, and take the kids. Bear this in mind when they hold themselves up as moral paragons.

When they tell us the Islamofascists are a threat to our way of life, they are quite correctly pointing out that there are fascists threatening our way of life. They're just deflecting their own intentions on to brown people far away. Bear this in mind before assuming they share your belief in constitutional democracy.

When they accuse reality-based folks of promoting "junk science," they're telling us they basically think all science is junk. Bear this in mind before attempting to present them with convincing evidence of anything.

When they tell us to support the troops, what they're really saying is: You better, because we won't. Bear this in mind when you evaluate the real costs of the war.

When they tell us the government can't be trusted, they're telling us they can't be trusted to govern. Bear this in mind every time you step into a voting booth.

She obviously focuses on political conservatives, but there are lots of other good examples, in and out of the political realm. In my personal experience, keeping this principle in mind has been useful for making sense of various family squabbles.

democracy and anarchy

Another excerpt from Chomsky On Anarchism, this from a 2004 interview with Ziga Vodovnik.

Ordinary people often confuse anarchism with chaos and violence, and do not know that anarchism (an archos) doesn't mean life or a state of things without rules, but rather a highly organized social order, life without a ruler, "principe." Is pejorative usage of the word anarchism maybe a direct consequence of the fact that the idea that people could be free was and is extremely frightening to those in power?

There has been an element within the anarchist movement that has been concerned with "propaganda by the deed," often with violence, and it is quite natural that power centers seize on it in an effort to undermine any attempt for independence and freedom, by identifying it with violence. But that is not true just for anarchism. Even democracy is feared. It is so deep-seated that people can't even see it. If we take a look at the Boston Globe on July 4th - July 4th is of course Independence Day, praising independence, freedom, and democracy - we find that they had an article on George Bush's attempt to get some support in Europe, to mend fences after the conflict. They interviewed the foreign policy director of the "libertarian" Cato Institute, asking why Europeans are critical of the U.S. He said something like this: The problem is that Germany and France have weak governments, and if they go against the will of the population, they have to pay political cost. This is the libertarian Cato Institute talking. The fear of democracy and hatred of it is so profound that nobody even notices it.

It seems to me that many of the ideals of democracy, particularly those expressed by the founders of this nation, are quite admirable by anarchist standards, especially as compared to the actual state of things in our "democracy," which is why genuine democracy is feared in a similar way to anarchy. Thus, working to advance actual democracy is a reasonable intermediate action for someone convinced that anarchism is the ideal social vision.

kiss me

Is it just me or is this article basically saying, "Billick, I've always hated your ass and I'm fucking loving this shit"?

Anarchy

I've always struggled to classify myself according to any of the political ideologies that I've examined in any semblance of a serious way. But that was before I examined anarchism in a semblance of a serious way, and now I think I'd be pretty comfortable labeling myself an anarchist, where anarchism is loosely defined as a philosophy that all human interaction should be voluntary and thus rejects permanent authority. I tend to see anarchy as the fullest realization of human freedom.

I anticipate that a common response to advocacy for anarchism is that government is here to stay and thus anarchy is unrealistic. It is probably true that the institution of the state isn't going away any time soon, but that doesn't mean that anarchist philosophy has nothing to offer. In an essay from 1970 titled "Language and Freedom," published in Chomsky On Anarchism, the brilliant linguist and social critic Noam Chomsky writes that "social action must be animated by a vision of a future society, and by explicit judgments of value concerning the character of this future society." One who finds the vision of an anarchist society attractive can then engage in social action inspired by that vision, and guided by anarchist principles.

Chomsky goes on:

A vision of a future social order is in turn based on a concept of human nature. If in fact man is an indefinitely malleable, completely plastic being, with no innate structures of mind and no intrinsic needs of a cultural or social character, then he is a fit subject for the "shaping of behavior" by the state authority, the corporate manager, the technocrat, or the central committee. Those with some confidence in the human species will hope this is no so and will try to determine the intrinsic human characteristics that provide the framework for intellectual development, the growth of moral consciousness, cultural achievement, and participation in a free community.

Needless to say I am one of those who hopes man is not a blank slate, and I think scientific inquiry in the nearly 38 years since that essay was originally presented has brightened this hope.

Chomsky concludes:

I like to believe that the intensive study of one aspect of human psychology - human language - may contribute to a humanistic social science that will serve, as well, as an instrument for social action. It must, needless to say, be stressed that social action cannot await a firmly established theory of man and society, nor can the validity of the latter be determined by our hopes and moral judgments. The two - speculation and action - must progress as best they can, looking forward to the day when theoretical inquiry will provide a firm guide to the unending, often grim, but never hopeless struggle for freedom and social justice.

Just like I was an atheist before I realized it, I was an anarchist before my recent investigation of the subject, and I think that my personal statement attached to my graduate school applications (I might publish part or all of it in a future post) essentially identified a similar thought progression as a primary reason that I want to study psychology (though probably not language specifically). Understanding the nature of humanity can help create a better social structure, and regular readers certainly know what little regard I have for the current social structure.

back to it

It is growing more and more clear to me how totally insane the world is and at the same time less and less clear how to feel about it. As for the other question - what to do about it - I'm as convinced as anything by the 'stop traffic' approach, though the idea that anyone can do anything seems rather ridiculous.

xmas trip recap

Well we're back from our whirlwind tour of Maryland. We put 1600 miles on the car (I'm thinking about buying carbon offsets - any suggestions anyone?), slept in 8 different places (some more comfortable than others), had some good meals and some bad ones, had some good times and some bad ones, and despite enjoying our trip, we're both quite glad to be home.

As for possible topics for blogging in the near future:

• I read a lot of Chomsky on the trip, and imagine I'll be blogging about it. I also landed a handful of books as gifts, and they'll be showing up too.
• I won my fantasy football league, which was worth $320. Perhaps I'll share my secrets to paying a month's rent with your fantasy sports prowess. (Teaser: Step One is to move to rural Ohio.)
• We encountered all kinds of family drama, which at first I thought I shouldn't really write about. But then I realized that I'm only aware of one family member reading my blog with any regularity, so what's the difference right? And in a way that inattention is related to the drama, so there's all kinds of opportunity for the self-conscious meta-analysis on which this blog was founded.
• The cats traveled with us, and spent an exciting evening with an energetic 8 week old mini-beagle. An overload of cuteness was the inevitable outcome. Also, the puppy pooped in the litter box.
• We saw I Am Legend and The Golden Compass. I'd cautiously recommend both and might elaborate in a future post.
• I've submitted 3 of the 4 grad school applications I'll be completing (the last is due by January 15), and might share some thoughts on that subject.
• My friends are really starting to reproduce. I hung out with two infants and a pregnant woman. This feels like some kind of life passage. (I myself have no plans for reproduction in my near future. Maybe if we get one part-time job between the two of us...)

That's all I got for now. If you're part of my immense audience the is here for the kinds of powerful political insights I usually generously provide, I'd suggest clicking on some of the blog articles linked to in my sidebar or here.

adspar disappears for newtonmas

Not that I ever blog any more, but I'll be home for the holidays from tomorrow to some time late in the month, and so I won't be posting for a while probably. I'll make it up to you guys, I promise!

This post makes way more sense than post are usually allowed to make

Before I get back to my latest stray cat rescue attempt, here are these things.

1.) Courtesy of Glenn Greenwald, here is Noam Chomsky making way more sense than people are usually allowed to make.



2.) Courtesy of Walt, here is Santa Claus making way more sense than people are usually allowed to make.



3.) Nancy Pelosi fails the Jason Bourne Test and so she must go down. The Jason Bourne Test makes way more sense than tests are usually allowed to make.

hope for the fraidy cats

The cute little guy who was hanging around our door has been living in our bathroom for the last 24 hours. We got him in the house, and he hated it at first, but he's made huge progress. He went from being terrified of us to seeking out and loving our affection. We have a vet appointment for him tomorrow to make sure he's healthy and free of diseases and parasites, and we'll get him fixed soon too. We're still not sure if we want to keep him or just socialize him and then find another home for him. He's not going to be interacting directly with our cats until we know it is safe.

Meanwhile the shelter I built intended for him has another occupant, and two other interested parties. There have been some fights over the rights to sleep in it. So we built another one that isn't quite as good, and we're not sure if anyone is taking that one or not. One of those three cats, the dominant one, seems extremely friendly to humans, so we're definitely planning to take him to the shelter.

In regards to the shelter, we've learned that the two adult female cats we've taken there have both been adopted, and the baby kitten is still too young to give out, but he's likely to be adopted as well. So we're getting pretty confident that any friendly cat we take there will end up in a home. We're just reluctant to take in a cat that is scared of people, but the guy in the bathroom is teaching us that there's hope even for the fraidy cats.

I feel pretty good about helping these poor things. It is damn cold out there. As long as there are friendly ones on the stoop, we'll be trying to get them into a better situation.

RIP Chip Reese

One of the greatest poker players of all time, Chip Reese, dead at 56.

more stray cats

It has started to get very cold here, and a few nights ago a tiny kitten and his mother showed up on our doorstep. We put out one of our cat carriers with a warm blanket in it, and they slept there. The next morning we took both of them to the shelter.

I'm reluctant to take an animal from its home area and put it in a cage somewhere, especially at a shelter that does kill some of its animals, but in their case I think it made sense. The kitten was still young and cute and could likely still get used to people, so he seems very likely to be adopted. The mother is healthy-looking and attractive, and she was somewhat open to human touch. Plus she looked like she might be pregnant again. The shelter says they have a very good adoption rate, so I think it was the right thing to do in their case.

Now there's another cat outside our door. We had seen it hanging around with those other two, and we suspect it is an older kitten from the same mother. This guy is somewhat afraid of people, and does not like being inside at all. I don't quite know what to do with him (or her), because his extra wildness seems to make it less adoptable and thus more likely to get killed. But it is getting really cold outside, and he clearly wants something from us. He looks well-fed, so he must be getting food from somewhere.

My best idea is maybe to put together some kind of more permanent shelter for him, but I don't really want to start feeding him. I'd kind of like to get him fixed and immunized too. But I'm kind of averse to spending so much time and money on this guy, for fear that soon I'd be doing it for more of them.

Ugh.

Popularity contests for mortals

CHALLENGERELIGION.COM

Watch out, godless motherfuckers! See For Yourself is climbing in the charts!

Steve Francis

Abbott on Stevie Franchise:

After playing a key role in a big win for the first time in a long time, Steve Francis was hilarious in the post-game TV interview last night. Arm draped casually around the interviewer's shoulder, joke at the ready, and clearly in no hurry ... he was like Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard: ready for his closeup. Jason Friedman of the Houston Press reflects on his two good games: "Francis is like that loveable kid in your class with a knack for saying or doing the wrong things at the wrong time. As much as you like the guy, you can't stop wondering what he could accomplish if he just buckled down and applied himself. Sometimes, he gets kicked out of class, after which he always comes back contrite and respectful. But the moment he starts feeling comfortable again, the shenanigans return. So you have to ask yourself: Will this time be any different? The thing is, the Rockets don't need Stevie to be the Franchise of old. They'd happily settle for Manu Ginobili-Lite; someone who can come off the bench, fill-up the stat sheet, and provide a spark with his energy, offense and derring-do. That's exactly what Francis has done the last two games. Both resulted in Rockets wins. So know this: The class is watching you, Stevie. They're also pulling for you. What will you do next?"

This seems about right to me. Francis was one-and-done at Maryland my freshman year, and I've always had conflicted feelings about him. He does seem like a very nice and likeable guy, from limited firsthand experience and from various stories I've heard. As a pro he's been rather petulant at times, but that seems more because he wears his heart on his sleeve and is maybe a bit immature than because he's some kind of chronic malcontent.

Aside from the personal level, I both love and hate his game. He's an amazing athlete and can been very fun to watch, but he tends to take bad shots and play selfishly. But he's been a great rebounder and good assist man, and does seem like he wants to get his teammates involved and win. I always wished that he'd be able to channel his talent in a positive, team-friendly way. I can't help but thinking that coaching has failed him a bit, though I'm sure he bears significant responsibility as well. He should really be used as a shooting guard, rather than at point, and maybe a bench role would work best at this point in his career. Iverson has shown us that its hard to build an elite team around an undersized shooting guard with a poor field goal percentage. Steve can't really be The Franchise any more, but maybe that Ginobili-lite role would be a good one.

Time Magazine Lies and the Power Perspective

Glenn Greenwald has a recent series of posts showing how Time Magazine publishes blatant lies that serve a clear political agenda (you can go find the links). The basic story is quite familiar; the writer simply asked a few partisans about a pending bill and printed their talking points without verifying the facts at all. The whole premise of his column was built around a blatant lie.

In response to the controversy, the offending writer, Joe Klein, has gone through a series of embarrassing denials, weaseling, and obfuscating. The punchline is his recent quote that "I have neither the time nor legal background to figure out who's right." He seems to think this is a defense, because in his pathetic bubble world of elite beltway journalists, investigating reality is not something anyone is expected to be interested in or capable of doing. They just repeat what their sources say.

Political operatives are well aware of this, and hence are unconstrained by truth when they feed information to such "journalists." From some perspectives, this tends to favor Republicans. This isn't incorrect, though other perspectives provide more clarity: the powerful use their power to to their benefit, and the truth is rarely their friend.

college football too

From deep in the belly of the beast, Buckeye country, I risk life and limb by passing along this scathing criticism of the college football industry. A highlight:

From Creation -- Rutgers beat Princeton on Nov. 6, 1869 -- college football has been criticized for being violent, commercial, and a higher-education distraction of the first order. That's why we love it. Not to mention the chance to play war, invent fungible icons, and engage in acceptable homosocial behavior.

The true heroes of the game have not been the players -- usually too young to be interesting in their firefly careers -- but the loud, devious, flim-flam artists who convince the young that winning a game as a group is more important than any kind of individual expression. The most manipulative of them succeed by convincing "their" boys that they are a "band of brothers" who can trust only each other and need to sacrifice their bodies (more and more often now at the expense of their future health) for the greater good. Most college players understand that they are being played, but they do genuinely love the game, the contact, their friends, the steam of the locker-room.

From Pop Warner at the Carlisle Indian School through Bear Bryant at Alabama to Tom Osborne at Nebraska -- who, after I questioned his repeated "forgiveness" of a felonious running back, asked me if I'd rather have the player loose in my neighborhood -- the unstated mission of coaches has been to provide a model for controlling and exploiting young manhood for factories, corporations, and armies.