In the wake of the recent vote in Ireland, there is some concern about what the Church's teachings can say to the new generation. To understand what can be said, first you must understand what the new generation is endorsing. It is not (merely) a different position on a few discrete issues. There's a developed and unified mode of thought at work behind it. It tracks to John S. Mill, but has filled out over time.
The first assumption of this new philosophy is Mill's assumption, which is that the important element in human life is the individual. Where Aristotle thought (correctly, I believe) that societies are formed by families, Mill took the Modern position that the thing that comes before society is a state of nature made up of radical individuals. This assumption is unquestioned in the new philosophy as far as I can tell. The individual and the individual's will is the thing that matters.
The second assumption follows from the first: the individuals we are talking about are fully-formed adults. The first assumption means that the wishes of an individual will always be selected for when they come into conflict with the interests of families considered as a whole. The second means that the wishes of adults will be placed before the wishes of non-adults: abortion is at the will of the adult individual who is pregnant, without other considerations. The family structure that is best for children is the one that is best for the adult individual parent given custody of them, so long as that structure does not produce adults who are out of line with the new philosophy. Homeschooling is a questionable practice; single motherhood is not.
Those are assumptions, as I said: they are not argued for, but taken as given.
Proceeding, then, given those assumptions, the philosophy is that sexuality should be regulated this way:
1) Adult individuals should be free to choose.
2) Freedom to choose is not compatible with any sort of coercion.
3) Therefore, sex is fine as long as it is consented to freely, verbally, and enthusiastically.
It's a very simple philosophy, but it is coherent. Many on the right make the mistake of assuming there is some conflict between the left's position that women are the equals of men in all respects, and that they need special protections in college, in the office, in the workplace in general, from harsh language or offensive terms. All of it follows from what has been said above. Both the man and the woman are equals in that they are free to choose. However, men are physically bigger and stronger; in addition, it is argued, society provides men with unearned power over women in various ways. Thus, to ensure that sex is always only fully consensual, we must regulate all sexual interactions to ensure that there was no power relationship providing any sort of coercion. We should ensure that there was clear, explicit, verbal consent and that such consent was really desired in a deep way.
The reason you get 'gay marriage' out of this is that there's absolutely nothing in this philosophy to speak against it. It's fully consensual, and an association of adults, so it's perfectly fine. There's not only no reason to be opposed to it here, there's no room for a reason. The principles are clear bright lines, and they admit of no exceptions.
From this, then, you will not get bestiality and pedophilia in spite of right-leaning arguments to the contrary. Kant thought you would, so it's not a foolish position, but it depends on assuming that the bright lines of the old system are the only possible ones. There the bright line was human nature, and it is obvious that sex fills a natural and necessary function. You can draw a bright line between those acts that do and those that do not fill natural functions. That was the old position, and it is a rational one. The new argument rejects the concept of human nature, however, in favor of individual will. There is just no room in the system for a concept of nature that should constrain will.
You will not get bestiality because consent is not possible. There is no slippery slope there. You will not get pedophilia because of consent issues, and the underlying assumption that this is a system for adults. The slippery slope there is limited to arguments about just how young you have to be before you can't clearly consent, but there's no danger of that line falling beyond a certain point.
What you will get is polyamory and plural marriage, and all of the trans-* desiderata. Those things are perfectly in line with this philosophy, and there is no reason to oppose them possible within the system.
Now, the reason to spell all this out is to address the question: what can the Church say to people who believe this philosophy? Well, you can't persuade them to adopt the old standards without first persuading them to abandon this entire mode of thinking about sexuality (which they will call "my sexuality," because everything is fully individualized in this philosophical structure). You have to show that the whole mode of thought is to be rejected, and then begin again showing why the traditional mode is a rational and proper substitute.
What you need not do, and ought not do, is argue for the rules. The rules follow from the structure. What you have to do is argue against their structure, and in favor of the traditional structure of reasoning from things we can observe about human nature.
How do you argue against the structure of the new philosophy? There are two general modes of argument that can be effective.
1) Argue against the assumptions. It happens that the assumptions are both badly wrong, so a lot of headway can be made here. Point out that these assumptions exist, and that the structure depends on both of them being true. Show that they are false. Human beings do not come into the world as radical individuals. We come into the world dependent on those who brought us into the world, and who care for us until we are able to take care of ourselves. That is to say, we come into the world not as clean actors free to choose anything that they want so long as it does not harm others, but as members of a pre-existing society who carry debts and obligations to those who helped them when they were weak. Those debts point forward to the next generation. We are duty bound to think about what is best for them, and not only about ourselves.
2) Argue against the good being pursued. The good is pleasure. Mill's philosophy believes that life is properly structured around pursuing pleasure and avoiding pain, according to rules (such as the three rules of the new philosophy) that make sure that these opportunities are as widely available as possible. But pleasure is a terrible standard for ethics. It is opportunity for pleasure and pain that ethics needs to control, because it is in temptation of pleasure or danger of pain that we are most likely to do wrong against others. Ethics needs to focus on how to ensure that we don't give in to our temptations to pleasure as much as it needs to talk about how we stand true to our duty in spite of the occasion of pain. Mill's rules are inadequate because they leave in place the idea that we should chase pleasure and flee pain as much as possible without being unfair to others. What we should be chasing and fleeing is something else entirely.
We might begin by saying that we should chase what is honorable and flee dishonor. (Aquinas says that, in his treatment of the virtue of magnanimity). Honor and dishonor are not personal like pleasure or pain, but have to do with relationships between human beings. They are the first answer to the idea of radical individualism as the proper seat of the good. The honorable is always about what you do from duty, and the dishonorable is always about letting others down who had a right to depend upon you.
Of course the Church will not wish to stop with honor and dishonor. It has something more to say, something that can become clearer to those who have begun following you on this road. When you have begun them in this direction, so that they see that their lives have some better end than pleasure, you will be doing again your ancient service to humankind.
Memorial Day
Cattle die, kindred die,
Every man is mortal:
But the good name never dies
Of one who has done well.
Cattle die, kindred die,
Every man is mortal:
But I know one thing that never dies,
The glory of the great dead.
-The Havamal
Airborne Beer All the Way!
A good story from Stars and Stripes that I stole from Ace:
It took 65 years for Vincent Speranza to find out that his actions in Belgium during World War II had been immortalized — for his ingenuity with the beverage that the country is famous for producing....
Speranza joined the Army in 1943 right after graduating from high school. He was assigned to Company H, 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, as a replacement in November 1944 while the unit licked its wounds from the devastating failure of Operation Market-Garden.Within weeks, Speranza would be in a foxhole in Bastogne, Belgium — cold, running short on supplies and ammo and surrounded by German troops....
On the second day of the siege, a friend named Joe Willis was wounded with shrapnel in both legs and brought to a makeshift combat hospital in a blown-out church. When Speranza tracked him down, the fellow paratrooper asked him to get him something to drink.Speranza explained they were surrounded and no supplies were coming in. The soldier asked him to check a devastated tavern nearby.Speranza found a working beer tap there. He filled his helmet — the same one he had used as a foxhole toilet — and made two trips to the wounded in the church. He was caught by an angry major and told he would be shot if he did not stop, for fear he would kill the wounded.Visiting Bastogne in 2009, Speranza found his foxhole still there, but Dutch and Belgian military officials told him that the legend of the soldier filling his helmet with beer for the wounded is still told — and had been immortalized on the label of Bastogne’s Airborne beer.The beer is typically consumed from a ceramic helmet.
So, I had to find the beer. The website Untappd gives enough information that I should be able to order it. I wonder about the helmet mugs, though. (Pics at the linked page.)
There is more about Speranza's service and a video of him telling the story at Stars and Stripes.
Pentecost
The king stablished all his knights, and gave them that were of lands not rich, he gave them lands, and charged them never to do outrageousity nor murder, and always to flee treason; also, by no mean to be cruel, but to give mercy unto him that asketh mercy, upon pain of forfeiture of their worship and lordship of King Arthur for evermore; and always to do ladies, damosels, and gentlewomen succor upon pain of death. Also, that no man take no battles in a wrongful quarrel for no law, ne for no world’s goods. Unto this were all the knights sworn of the Table Round, both old and young. And every year were they sworn at the high feast of Pentecost.
-Le Morte Darthur
1 The hand of the Lord came upon me, and he led me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me in the center of the broad valley. It was filled with bones.
2 He made me walk among them in every direction. So many lay on the surface of the valley! How dry they were!
3 He asked me: Son of man, can these bones come back to life? “Lord God,” I answered, “you alone know that.”
4 Then he said to me: Prophesy over these bones, and say to them: Dry bones, hear the word of the Lord!
5 Thus says the Lord God to these bones: Listen! I will make breath enter you so you may come to life.
6 I will put sinews on you, make flesh grow over you, cover you with skin, and put breath into you so you may come to life. Then you shall know that I am the Lord.
7 I prophesied as I had been commanded. A sound started up, as I was prophesying, rattling like thunder. The bones came together, bone joining to bone.
8 As I watched, sinews appeared on them, flesh grew over them, skin covered them on top, but there was no breath in them.
9 Then he said to me: Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, son of man! Say to the breath: Thus says the Lord God: From the four winds come, O breath, and breathe into these slain that they may come to life.
10 I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath entered them; they came to life and stood on their feet, a vast army.
-Ezekiel 37:1-10
Some Details Leak Out
What's in the secret treaty? An economist writes:
Companies can sue governments for full compensation for any reduction in their future expected profits resulting from regulatory changes.I can't see why we'd want to further mortgage our democratic institutions to major corporations. Don't they exercise enough control over our form of government already, without granting them a unique right to sue us for any new laws that interfere with their "expected" profits?
This is not just a theoretical possibility. Philip Morris is suing Uruguay and Australia for requiring warning labels on cigarettes. Admittedly, both countries went a little further than the US, mandating the inclusion of graphic images showing the consequences of cigarette smoking.
The labeling is working. It is discouraging smoking. So now Philip Morris is demanding to be compensated for lost profits....
The proceedings are so expensive that Uruguay has had to turn to Michael Bloomberg and other wealthy Americans committed to health to defend itself against Philip Morris. And, though corporations can bring suit, others cannot. If there is a violation of other commitments - on labor and environmental standards, for example - citizens, unions, and civil-society groups have no recourse.
Useful...
“We have accomplished what no one said can be done, which is to be a trip for peace, for reconciliation, for human rights and a trip to which both governments agreed,” Steinem, 81, told South Korean media after crossing. “We were able to be citizen diplomats.”Who said it couldn't be done? North Korea was delighted with the opportunity to help you stage their propaganda.
Lyric Inanity
Ten years ago, the most popular songs read between a third and fourth grade level, but the inanity only increased with time, and after a five-year downward tumble ending in 2014 (the last year of the study), chart-topping hits had a reading level equivalent to second or third grade. Broken into genres, the levels measured just 2.6 for Hip-hop/R&B, a tie of 2.9 for Rock and Pop, and faring best was Country at 3.3[.]In fairness, it seems like the popular singers only read at that level.
Accounting
At some point on this side of the grave, I may learn to stop regretting all the things I never took the time to study properly in my youth. This week, I've spent nearly every waking hour trying to learn to think like QuickBooks, once again exposing the gap in my education where some simple business finance belongs. By very good luck, one of my first clients was very good at explaining the most basic principles of bookkeeping to me, in order to help me decipher a real estate closing statement when we bought our first house. Once you get used to the idea of debt entries balancing credit entries, it's not too bad--sort of a double vision, from your viewpoint and the view point of the other. Nevertheless, many aspects of GAAP will likely remain mysterious forever.
In a weak moment recently, I raised my hand for the job of treasurer in the local Woman's Club. Like many such organizations, it's hard to find people willing to serve as officers every year. The job of cheerleader or vision developer is decidedly not for me, but I thought I could handle the checkbook. It turns out that, a couple of years ago, the club acquired a QuickBooks program, so I dived into figuring out how to use this small-business accounting software.
The previous treasurer had confined herself to the checkbook-register functions, keeping the members' running accounts on a separate Excel spreadsheet. Because this offends my sense of efficiency (i.e., laziness), by requiring the treasurer to enter everything twice, I tried experimenting with the other functions and reading various manuals online. Soon I broke down and bought a month's worth of tech support by telephone, thus embarking on an exciting half-week of lengthy conversations with nice young people from the Asian subcontinent, most of whom couldn't be brought to understand just how s-l-o-w-l-y they were going to have to talk in order to surmount both the language barrier and my lack of digital and accounting sophistication. What jobs they must have.
It's a startling pleasure finally to master something like how to collect a bushelful of miscellaneous payments for dues and cookbooks in the form of cash and checks, enter them into each member's account, and tell the program to batch all the payments into a single deposit in a particular bank. Et voilà! A deposit entry pops up automatically in the bank register with a "split" to explain all 50-odd individual elements, all properly encoded by type for the summary reports that will be distributed at each monthly meeting. At the same time, an accounts receivable page shows me who's paid dues and who still owes. I'll be able to prepare an annual budget and produce monthly budget-vs.-actual reports. It's becoming clear how double-entry book-keeping brought commercial life out of the dark ages.
I'm still barely using a small corner of this program, which can handle things like payroll that our club doesn't need. How amazing that such a product is available for about $200.
In a weak moment recently, I raised my hand for the job of treasurer in the local Woman's Club. Like many such organizations, it's hard to find people willing to serve as officers every year. The job of cheerleader or vision developer is decidedly not for me, but I thought I could handle the checkbook. It turns out that, a couple of years ago, the club acquired a QuickBooks program, so I dived into figuring out how to use this small-business accounting software.
The previous treasurer had confined herself to the checkbook-register functions, keeping the members' running accounts on a separate Excel spreadsheet. Because this offends my sense of efficiency (i.e., laziness), by requiring the treasurer to enter everything twice, I tried experimenting with the other functions and reading various manuals online. Soon I broke down and bought a month's worth of tech support by telephone, thus embarking on an exciting half-week of lengthy conversations with nice young people from the Asian subcontinent, most of whom couldn't be brought to understand just how s-l-o-w-l-y they were going to have to talk in order to surmount both the language barrier and my lack of digital and accounting sophistication. What jobs they must have.
It's a startling pleasure finally to master something like how to collect a bushelful of miscellaneous payments for dues and cookbooks in the form of cash and checks, enter them into each member's account, and tell the program to batch all the payments into a single deposit in a particular bank. Et voilà! A deposit entry pops up automatically in the bank register with a "split" to explain all 50-odd individual elements, all properly encoded by type for the summary reports that will be distributed at each monthly meeting. At the same time, an accounts receivable page shows me who's paid dues and who still owes. I'll be able to prepare an annual budget and produce monthly budget-vs.-actual reports. It's becoming clear how double-entry book-keeping brought commercial life out of the dark ages.
I'm still barely using a small corner of this program, which can handle things like payroll that our club doesn't need. How amazing that such a product is available for about $200.
Animal vid fix
You've all been thinking, "Hasn't it been a long time since Tex posted a good animal video?" Fresh from Maggie's Farm: dogs hooked on soda siphons.
Humility
Fed Head (Head of the Fed! Banks in Red! Got to get their coffers fed!) Janet Yellen speaks the truth:
I am describing the outlook that I see as most likely, but based on many years of making economic projections, I can assure you that any specific projection I write down will turn out to be wrong, perhaps markedly so.The only thing that will never happen is the thing you planned for.
Reshaping Ownership
No, I don't think so, General Motors.
GM has joined with John Deere in asking the government to confirm that you literally cannot own your car because of the software in its engine.With one exception, all my cars and trucks have been Chevrolets. The only way I'd be willing to "license" a vehicle I wasn't allowed to work on myself was if you agreed to fix it for free or replace it for free, for however long the "license" lasts. Those are the terms I get when I rent a car, and they're acceptable. I'm not about to 'buy' a car from you without owning it.
Like Deere, GM wants to stop the Copyright Office from granting an exemption to the Digital Millennium Copyright Act that would allow you to jailbreak the code in your car's engine so that you can take it to a non-GM mechanic for service, or fix it yourself. By controlling who can service your car, GM can force you to buy only official, expensive parts, protecting its bottom line.
As Consumerist quips, GM wants you to know that the car in the driveway is "literally not your father's Oldsmobile."
Best Behavior
With the Waco dust-up just behind us, the Mongols MC is taking unusual steps to reach out to the community ahead of their annual meeting.
The Mongols may be on their best behavior in part because they have a court case coming up soon that is of tremendous importance to them.
It'll be an interesting case, especially with the Waco shootout so close in memory. It seems like there's something special about the government seizing a trademark. Free speech rights are against the government and not against other citizens. As a result, you have a right to violate a trademark in the sense that the government can't stop you from saying whatever you're going to say. However, the government can enforce someone else's copyright by requiring you to pay damages to them for violating that copyright. In this case, the government would essentially be requiring you to pay damages to them -- making it hard to discern a difference between the civil damages and a fine.
Can the government use this power more broadly to fine you for saying something it doesn't want you to say? Could the government, in principle, decide to seize the copyrights of a book they didn't like, and forbid anyone from printing copies of it? How about a religious book -- various translations or editions of the Bible, say? It's the same Amendment where all these protections cluster, so it seems as if they're all in danger together.
Ordinarily I'd think the Mongols were likely to win a case like this, but after last week it's hard to say. It's a moment at which it may be hard to get the judge to think about the more theoretical questions regarding how the precedent could be more broadly applied, and less about the very public and concrete example of violence.
The president of a motorcycle club gathering in Excelsior Springs this weekend promises it will be peaceful. In an interview with KMBC 9 News, Mongol Gary tried to ease concerns of violence in the wake of last weekend’s shootings...If you watch the video, it sounds like the Mongols didn't just grant an interview, they may have sought it out. Talking their plans over with law enforcement is also a little unusual, but the police appear to have appreciated the courtesy.
Excelsior Springs police said they’ve known about the event for months, have had conversations with Mongols leaders and expect an easy weekend, even though they’ll be preparing for the worst.
The Mongols may be on their best behavior in part because they have a court case coming up soon that is of tremendous importance to them.
As part of a plea deal, the club president forfeited rights to the Mongol trademark to the Department of Justice, and a federal judge granted an injunction prohibiting club members from wearing, licensing, selling, or distributing the any materials depicting the Mongolian warrior.Maybe the Masonic compass. I don't think the other two are good analogies.
At the time, only Uncle Sam was legally entitled to wear the Mongols' leather vest -- known as a "cut" -- as a jacket without sleeves.
Federal Judge Florence-Marie Cooper ruled that upon presentation of the court's order by police, "defendants and all their agents, servants, employees, family members, and other persons in active participation with them, must surrender all products, clothing, vehicles, motorcycles, books, posters, merchandise, stationery, or other materials bearing the Mongols trademark."
While another judge partially lifted that injunction a few years later, Uncle Sam and the Mongol Nation are headed back to federal court June 2 in Los Angeles to reargue the case and determine who now owns the trademark.
The Mongols mount a First Amendment defense, arguing in court papers the "government's sole purpose in filing the indictment is to crush the Mongols Nation Motorcycle Club by seizing the intellectual rights to the 'Rider' and 'Mongol' marks and thereby quash the Club and its members rights to freedom of expression and association." ... To Davis, the DOJ actions are "unprecedented and unconstitutional." He said the Mongol's insignia is a "collective membership mark" that's "on a par with the Christian cross, the Masonic compass, or the Jewish star."
It'll be an interesting case, especially with the Waco shootout so close in memory. It seems like there's something special about the government seizing a trademark. Free speech rights are against the government and not against other citizens. As a result, you have a right to violate a trademark in the sense that the government can't stop you from saying whatever you're going to say. However, the government can enforce someone else's copyright by requiring you to pay damages to them for violating that copyright. In this case, the government would essentially be requiring you to pay damages to them -- making it hard to discern a difference between the civil damages and a fine.
Can the government use this power more broadly to fine you for saying something it doesn't want you to say? Could the government, in principle, decide to seize the copyrights of a book they didn't like, and forbid anyone from printing copies of it? How about a religious book -- various translations or editions of the Bible, say? It's the same Amendment where all these protections cluster, so it seems as if they're all in danger together.
Ordinarily I'd think the Mongols were likely to win a case like this, but after last week it's hard to say. It's a moment at which it may be hard to get the judge to think about the more theoretical questions regarding how the precedent could be more broadly applied, and less about the very public and concrete example of violence.
"Public" Comments
Did you know there's a surge of interest in giving the EPA expanded authority?
Oddly enough we were just talking about the difficulty for citizens in influencing the bureaucratic rule-making processes. Pretty much the only way is through the public comment period, when the agency happens to ask for one. If they are now permitted ("required," it sounds like) to game the system by flooding themselves with positive comments from full-time policy organizations that favor their position, that tiny bit of influence will be diluted out of existence.
Once again, the Obama administration is making a mockery out of the ordinary forms of our democratic republic. Rule of law can be set aside by prosecutorial discretion. Rule making comment periods can be gamed. The IRS can be tasked with paying special attention to your enemies. Pervasive surveillance replaces the need for warrants before prying into private communications.
It's a disturbing pattern, and one that will be hard to reform.
When the Environmental Protection Agency proposed a major new rule intended to protect the nation’s drinking water last year, regulators solicited opinions from the public. The purpose of the “public comment” period was to objectively gauge Americans’ sentiment before changing a policy that could profoundly affect their lives.Amazing! Who knew the American public was so committed to expanding the range of the EPA's authority?
Gina McCarthy, the agency’s administrator, told a Senate committee in March that the agency had received more than one million comments, and nearly 90 percent favored the agency’s proposal.
But critics say there is a reason for the overwhelming result: The E.P.A. had a hand in manufacturing it.Oh.
In a campaign that tests the limits of federal lobbying law, the agency orchestrated a drive to counter political opposition from Republicans and enlist public support in concert with liberal environmental groups and a grass-roots organization aligned with President Obama.
Oddly enough we were just talking about the difficulty for citizens in influencing the bureaucratic rule-making processes. Pretty much the only way is through the public comment period, when the agency happens to ask for one. If they are now permitted ("required," it sounds like) to game the system by flooding themselves with positive comments from full-time policy organizations that favor their position, that tiny bit of influence will be diluted out of existence.
Once again, the Obama administration is making a mockery out of the ordinary forms of our democratic republic. Rule of law can be set aside by prosecutorial discretion. Rule making comment periods can be gamed. The IRS can be tasked with paying special attention to your enemies. Pervasive surveillance replaces the need for warrants before prying into private communications.
It's a disturbing pattern, and one that will be hard to reform.
Ms. Steinem in North Korea
Ah, the march of dignity. It's always worth reading direct translations of the original Korean KCNA articles.
Fortunately, I'm told that elder stateswomen are not required to answer questions.
Fortunately, I'm told that elder stateswomen are not required to answer questions.
Should We Privatize Police?
The British are apparently considering it, which is funny since they mocked it as an American idea a few years ago:
On the other hand, private corporations working for the US Federal government can be disciplined quite quickly compared to civil bureaucracies. Compared with disciplining rogue activities at the IRS or CIA, we can pull a contract and hire another firm with relative ease. We're not very good at holding individuals accountable in either case, but civil service employees are notoriously difficult to fire.
The breathtaking list of policing activities up for grabs includes investigating crimes, detaining suspects, developing cases, responding to and investigating incidents, supporting victims and witnesses, managing high-risk individuals, patrolling neighbourhoods, managing intelligence, managing engagement with the public, as well as more traditional back-office functions, such as managing forensics, providing legal services, managing the vehicle fleet, finance and human resources... The contract notice does state that "bidders should note that not all these activities will necessarily be included in the final scope, and that each police force will select some activities from these areas where they see the best opportunities for transformation".Very often we see cities hire a police force rather than depending on the elected county sheriff, as many city councils (and even some county commissions) prefer to own the police department and its leadership rather than having to deal with elected officials who answer to the voters rather than to them. I wonder if this doesn't introduce a similar disconnect in accountability.
On the other hand, private corporations working for the US Federal government can be disciplined quite quickly compared to civil bureaucracies. Compared with disciplining rogue activities at the IRS or CIA, we can pull a contract and hire another firm with relative ease. We're not very good at holding individuals accountable in either case, but civil service employees are notoriously difficult to fire.
"You Can't Be Reasoned Out Of...
...what you were never reasoned into."
But persuasive!
The thing is, you really can engage reason and change people's minds about things. You just can't do it quickly. I've changed my mind about very many political questions over time, to include free trade (which sounded plausible before the evidence came in), abortion (I was against the practice personally but totally pro-choice before I began to study philosophy, and it is precisely thinking through the issue rationally that has convinced me that we should have much tighter legal restrictions on the practice), foreign policy (as a teenager and twenty-something I had isolationist sentiments that I've been reasoned out of over time), and so forth.
In the course of a single election cycle, though, you probably can't. Those tribal issues are algorithms we use to decide issues quickly, and most people don't pay attention to politics enough to do otherwise than decide when they really have to decide. So you get political responses that are more like, "Oh, yuck, he's in favor of it? I'm against it totally." Push people on this, and they'll push back harder because now you're trying to force them to do something they find gross and disgusting.
There's still reason to hope that persuasion and patient argument, or new evidence, will become persuasive over time. If there were not, there would be little reason to favor democratic forms of government.
Last year, UCLA grad student Michael LaCour and Columbia political scientist Donald Green published a startling finding, based on a experiment they ran: going door to door to try to persuade voters to support same-sex marriage works, they found, and it works especially well when the canvasser delivering the message is gay. They even found spillover effects: people who lived with voters who talked to a gay canvasser grew more supportive of same-sex marriage, too.Turns out, this exciting conclusion was a complete fraud.
This was a really exciting conclusion, for political scientists and laypeople alike. Past research has suggested that people's political views are tribal and largely impervious to rational persuasion. Dartmouth political scientist Brendan Nyhan and the University of Exeter's Jason Reifler have conducted multiple studies that show correcting people's incorrect views about, say, the presence of WMDs in Iraq can actually backfire and make them hold their wrong beliefs even more firmly.
But persuasive!
The thing is, you really can engage reason and change people's minds about things. You just can't do it quickly. I've changed my mind about very many political questions over time, to include free trade (which sounded plausible before the evidence came in), abortion (I was against the practice personally but totally pro-choice before I began to study philosophy, and it is precisely thinking through the issue rationally that has convinced me that we should have much tighter legal restrictions on the practice), foreign policy (as a teenager and twenty-something I had isolationist sentiments that I've been reasoned out of over time), and so forth.
In the course of a single election cycle, though, you probably can't. Those tribal issues are algorithms we use to decide issues quickly, and most people don't pay attention to politics enough to do otherwise than decide when they really have to decide. So you get political responses that are more like, "Oh, yuck, he's in favor of it? I'm against it totally." Push people on this, and they'll push back harder because now you're trying to force them to do something they find gross and disgusting.
There's still reason to hope that persuasion and patient argument, or new evidence, will become persuasive over time. If there were not, there would be little reason to favor democratic forms of government.
Not Quite
Megan McArdle would like you to believe that this is all your fault. Certainly there's an element of truth to the argument, and I am sure she really believes what she's writing here.
However, the blame for the radical change in economic conditions for new American workers is not merely the result of rational choices made by ordinary citizens in the marketplace or at the voting booth. It's true that Americans as consumers buy a lot of stuff from places that get their stuff from China. Some of those Americans have the option of buying American-made goods instead. Those things are now a luxury good, but they didn't used to be: it used to be that American-made clothing factories were all around the South, and it wasn't particularly more expensive to buy American-made and American-grown cotton.
Still, the major changes to the law that enabled globalization to undercut worker wages weren't enacted because of wide popular support. They were enacted because of lobbyists from wealthy interests. Did the massive losses of American jobs and family farms following NAFTA result in a net transfer of wealth from American workers to Mexican ones? No! It turns out it resulted in a net transfer of wealth from the workers of both countries to the wealthy interests, as the interests could more easily undercut workers on both sides of the border.
So the blame for the 'great reset' is only partly on the people who, in 2000 or so, bought the cheap shirts from Bangladesh instead of the slightly more expensive ones made in South Carolina. The blame is mostly on those who lobbied for this law, then used the advantages it gave them to put workers in competition with each other. Very little of the 'savings' got passed on to you as a consumer: inflation was pretty strong during that period, up until the financial collapse of 2008. Your money wasn't going further.
Also, buying American didn't become a luxury good slowly over time, as a result of the buildup of rational choices made by individuals in the marketplace. It happened suddenly, as a choice made by corporate entities that forced the consumers' hand. You can't buy American goods from South Carolina at near the same prices if all the factories were closed in a rush to take advantage of wage competitions enabled by the new law. "We" didn't make that choice at all.
Neither the economic choices nor the political ones are really in the hands of ordinary Americans. Possibly we can make the political choices going forward, though quite possibly not: the entrenched interests are very strong here. Still, let's not make the mistake of thinking that Americans are just having to live with the effects of their choices as consumers. Their choices as consumers had very little to do with the forces at work here. Not nothing, to be sure: but not nearly as much as economists like McArdle would like to believe.
However, the blame for the radical change in economic conditions for new American workers is not merely the result of rational choices made by ordinary citizens in the marketplace or at the voting booth. It's true that Americans as consumers buy a lot of stuff from places that get their stuff from China. Some of those Americans have the option of buying American-made goods instead. Those things are now a luxury good, but they didn't used to be: it used to be that American-made clothing factories were all around the South, and it wasn't particularly more expensive to buy American-made and American-grown cotton.
Still, the major changes to the law that enabled globalization to undercut worker wages weren't enacted because of wide popular support. They were enacted because of lobbyists from wealthy interests. Did the massive losses of American jobs and family farms following NAFTA result in a net transfer of wealth from American workers to Mexican ones? No! It turns out it resulted in a net transfer of wealth from the workers of both countries to the wealthy interests, as the interests could more easily undercut workers on both sides of the border.
[I]t is easy to see that NAFTA was a bad deal for most Americans. The promised trade surpluses with Mexico turned out to be deficits, some hundreds of thousands of jobs were lost, and there was downward pressure on US wages – which was, after all, the purpose of the agreement.... But what about Mexico? Didn't Mexico at least benefit from the agreement? Well if we look at the past 20 years, it's not a pretty picture. The most basic measure of economic progress, especially for a developing country like Mexico, is the growth of income (or GDP) per person. Out of 20 Latin American countries (South and Central America plus Mexico), Mexico ranks 18, with growth of less than 1% annually since 1994. It is, of course, possible to argue that Mexico would have done even worse without NAFTA, but then the question would be, why?The American public isn't against trade, either. The author is right, though, to say that while we're happy to trade, we don't think 'free trade' or even 'more trade' is an end in itself. Economic activity is a means to our ends, and for American and Mexican workers those ends have been harmed rather than helped by the free trade pact.
[Long analysis of why NAFTA didn't help Mexico clipped, but available at the link. -Grim]
It's tough to imagine Mexico doing worse without NAFTA. Perhaps this is part of the reason why Washington's proposed "Free Trade Area of the Americas" was roundly rejected by the region in 2005 and the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership is running into trouble. Interestingly, when economists who have promoted NAFTA from the beginning are called upon to defend the agreement, the best that they can offer is that it increased trade. But trade is not, to most humans, an end in itself.
So the blame for the 'great reset' is only partly on the people who, in 2000 or so, bought the cheap shirts from Bangladesh instead of the slightly more expensive ones made in South Carolina. The blame is mostly on those who lobbied for this law, then used the advantages it gave them to put workers in competition with each other. Very little of the 'savings' got passed on to you as a consumer: inflation was pretty strong during that period, up until the financial collapse of 2008. Your money wasn't going further.
Also, buying American didn't become a luxury good slowly over time, as a result of the buildup of rational choices made by individuals in the marketplace. It happened suddenly, as a choice made by corporate entities that forced the consumers' hand. You can't buy American goods from South Carolina at near the same prices if all the factories were closed in a rush to take advantage of wage competitions enabled by the new law. "We" didn't make that choice at all.
Neither the economic choices nor the political ones are really in the hands of ordinary Americans. Possibly we can make the political choices going forward, though quite possibly not: the entrenched interests are very strong here. Still, let's not make the mistake of thinking that Americans are just having to live with the effects of their choices as consumers. Their choices as consumers had very little to do with the forces at work here. Not nothing, to be sure: but not nearly as much as economists like McArdle would like to believe.
"Father" "Marries" "Son"
I suppose this represents a sort of progress, since what they are doing is more like marriage than it is like being father and son:
Norman MacArthur and Bill Novak, father and son, though not biologically, will soon be husband and … whatever, reports the Patch of Bucks County, Pennsylvania.That's the problem with pendulum swings. The 'domestic partner' law might have been stable, except it ran into places that refused to grant any status at all. So first they had to 'adopt' a ridiculous legal fiction, and now we're going to radically alter the institution of marriage for a while.
The pair, both in their 70s, have been together for 50 years and registered in New York City as domestic partners in 1994. But when they moved to Pennsylvania, they discovered their domestic partnership wasn’t recognized, and legalized same-sex marriage was nowhere on the horizon.
Needing to take care of estate-planning issues, the pair pursued a novel legal approach. Novak adopted MacArthur in 2000. The fact their parents were deceased removed any legal objection.
The Safety of Israel
Possibly in the long term it will prove to be the most dangerous place on earth, standing as it does under a Sword of Damocles in the form of a surrounding Middle East that nurtures a very deep grudge against its very existence. Still, for today, this is true.
UPDATE: I guess my radar's a little off. I realize this afternoon that the reason these comments are a story is that the authors are implying some sort of racism in the guy's commentary. "Certain parts of New York City or Chicago"... "or Baltimore" is supposed to be code, I guess.
Well, maybe. All the same, I've been to New York, I've been to Chicago, I've been to Baltimore, and there are certain parts of those cities that are objectively unsafe. They were having riots in Baltimore just recently, and Chicago's murder rate is periodically higher than Afghanistan's. I've also been to Jerusalem, and walking around Jerusalem even alone and late at night felt perfectly safe to me.
So, for what it's worth, if you're reading racism into his remarks it may not be appropriate. He may have been making a comment about Israel, not about race in America. That's how I read it at first.
UPDATE: Not to put too fine a point on it, but last weekend: 27 shootings, 9 fatal in Baltimore. Chicago? 56 shot over the same weekend, including a child. I don't see any for Jerusalem in the same period.
UPDATE: Murders are up in Manhattan too. And according to this list, Israel's total murder rate is 1.7 per 100,000 if you discount the deaths from the war; 1.8 per 100,000 if you don't. That's not great: most of Europe does much better than this, having rates in the zero-point range. The USA is 4.7 per 100,000. The Americas are the worst place in the world overall, even worse than Africa, with an average rate of 16.3. If you break it down by cities, all the worst places in the world are in the Americas, including two US cities: New Orleans and Baltimore.
So yeah. I think dude was objectively correct in his statements.
Rep. Barry Loudermilk, a Republican from Georgia, says he felt safer during a recent trip to Israel than he would “in certain parts of New York City or Chicago.... The whole time we were there, of course, we had security with us, but there was no restrictions on travel, we never felt threatened one bit... In fact, I can say that we felt safer in Israel than we would in certain parts of New York City or Chicago,” Loudermilk said.I had no security with me at any time, indeed was walking completely alone, and still felt perfectly safe. Even in East Jerusalem, even in the Arab parts of town. Several of the Arabs told me I was very welcome, I think because they want Americans to come and see the situation for ourselves. No one during the entire trip was even mildly threatening, except the Israeli security officer who pulled me aside to question me very intensely about my business in Israel when I first arrived. That was only his duty, and I took no offense.
“Yeah — or Baltimore, I would think, as well,” interjected host Tony Perkins.
UPDATE: I guess my radar's a little off. I realize this afternoon that the reason these comments are a story is that the authors are implying some sort of racism in the guy's commentary. "Certain parts of New York City or Chicago"... "or Baltimore" is supposed to be code, I guess.
Well, maybe. All the same, I've been to New York, I've been to Chicago, I've been to Baltimore, and there are certain parts of those cities that are objectively unsafe. They were having riots in Baltimore just recently, and Chicago's murder rate is periodically higher than Afghanistan's. I've also been to Jerusalem, and walking around Jerusalem even alone and late at night felt perfectly safe to me.
So, for what it's worth, if you're reading racism into his remarks it may not be appropriate. He may have been making a comment about Israel, not about race in America. That's how I read it at first.
UPDATE: Not to put too fine a point on it, but last weekend: 27 shootings, 9 fatal in Baltimore. Chicago? 56 shot over the same weekend, including a child. I don't see any for Jerusalem in the same period.
UPDATE: Murders are up in Manhattan too. And according to this list, Israel's total murder rate is 1.7 per 100,000 if you discount the deaths from the war; 1.8 per 100,000 if you don't. That's not great: most of Europe does much better than this, having rates in the zero-point range. The USA is 4.7 per 100,000. The Americas are the worst place in the world overall, even worse than Africa, with an average rate of 16.3. If you break it down by cities, all the worst places in the world are in the Americas, including two US cities: New Orleans and Baltimore.
So yeah. I think dude was objectively correct in his statements.
...As If A Million Voices Cried Out, And Never Shut Up...
Apparently the Waco dust-up has created a storm of mockery.
Twitter-space may be segregated, but military/veteran motorcycle clubs are not. Those are the ones you usually see with political figures. Whatever is wrong with race in America, this kind of biker isn't it.
UPDATE: Among what is mostly a critique of media tone:
Before the brawl -- let's call it a "riot" to avoid treating the cases as essentially 'different' in the way the article hates -- police tried to get the bar to refuse service to the clubs. When that failed, they deployed officers in overwatch positions around the gathering. They fired on the club members who were involved, and may well have killed some of the "rioters" (as they did not do in Baltimore). They mass-arrested nearly two hundred people, just as in Baltimore, and appear poised to charge nearly all of them with at least some crime. At least some of the charges look to be capital murder. If so, unlike in Baltimore, the government is planning to put people to death for participating in this riot.
Now, not to put too fine a point on it, but that's how you stop a riot. Shooting the rioters used to be the ordinary standard for dangerous rioting. It was clearly justified here.
Over in a corner of Twitter that most of white America doesn't visit (because apparently our social media networks are about as segregated as they are in real life), snark took over. Many tweeted ironically about the corrosive influence of biker culture on weekend warriors and the imperative need for white leaders to denounce the broader scourge of “white on white crime” in front of hashtags like, “#stuffthemedianeversays." Pictures of Sarah Palin and in leather biker gear popped up along below tweets about “radical white politicians, who “coddle,” and commune with, “thugs.” The subtext of all of it was clear: This is what the world’s paid and volunteer shouter corps say when the tragedies involve black people, not white.Well, here's a picture of Sarah Palin being cozy with some bikers. Tough guys, too, the kind who look like they know their way around an automatic weapon. You'd have to think twice before giving one them a gun, right?
"9 killed in Waco biker gang shootout - where are the white leaders decrying this white-on-white violence?" #stuffthemedianeversays
— John Fugelsang (@JohnFugelsang) May 18, 2015
Twitter-space may be segregated, but military/veteran motorcycle clubs are not. Those are the ones you usually see with political figures. Whatever is wrong with race in America, this kind of biker isn't it.
UPDATE: Among what is mostly a critique of media tone:
It started as a fist fight in the bathroom of the restaurant. The fight spread. People used clubs and chains and knives and guns. By one estimate, there were 30 people shooting. At least five gangs took part – six, if you count the police.I often criticize the police if I think they have over-deployed power against Americans. I think this person's argument is highly uncharitable given the performance of the police in Waco. It's also not justified by what follows in the article. A lot of ink is spilled on the difference in the way the media talks and thinks about Baltimore versus Waco, but there's nothing to justify the claim that the police acted in a "different" way.
Amazingly, no bystanders were hurt or killed, even though it took place at a shopping centre on a Sunday afternoon where people were shopping and celebrating graduations.
This comes when the riots in Baltimore on April 27th over the death of Freddie Gray at the hands of police is still fresh in everyone’s mind. The difference in how the police and the press acted is striking.
Before the brawl -- let's call it a "riot" to avoid treating the cases as essentially 'different' in the way the article hates -- police tried to get the bar to refuse service to the clubs. When that failed, they deployed officers in overwatch positions around the gathering. They fired on the club members who were involved, and may well have killed some of the "rioters" (as they did not do in Baltimore). They mass-arrested nearly two hundred people, just as in Baltimore, and appear poised to charge nearly all of them with at least some crime. At least some of the charges look to be capital murder. If so, unlike in Baltimore, the government is planning to put people to death for participating in this riot.
Now, not to put too fine a point on it, but that's how you stop a riot. Shooting the rioters used to be the ordinary standard for dangerous rioting. It was clearly justified here.
Deeply Dishonest
[A]nyone who has read the text of the [TPP] agreement could be jailed for disclosing its contents. I’ve actually read the TPP text provided to the government’s own advisors, and I’ve given the president an earful about how this trade deal will damage this nation. But I can’t share my criticisms with you....Emphasis added.
The government has created a perfect Catch 22: The law prohibits us from talking about the specifics of what we’ve seen, allowing the president to criticize us for not being specific. Instead of simply admitting that he disagrees with me—and with many other cleared advisors—about the merits of the TPP, the president instead pretends that our specific, pointed criticisms don’t exist.
No lying salesmen.
No secret treaties.
Odd Split
What kind of controversy gets the Supreme Court to line up Alito, Roberts, Kennedy, Breyer, and Sotomayor against Ginsburg, Scalia, Kagan, and Thomas? A suit over whether Maryland counties (and the city of Baltimore) must give credits to Maryland residents who pay taxes to other states for income they earn across state lines. This looks like a classic quarrel over whether the problem with a law is that it's lousy policy or that it violates the Constitution. What Constitutional principle limits taxes, you may wonder, and where has it been all our lives? In this case, the idea is that double-taxation across state lines amounts to a tariff on interstate commerce. If you don't find that convincing, you may side with strict-interpretationists Scalia and Thomas, and wish that the problem would be solved at the ballot box instead.
The press is generally reporting this as problematic because Maryland counties and the city of Baltimore need lots of cash, which apparently is the only useful consideration when it comes to taxation policy or the Constitutional limits on state power. Myself, I'd worry more about having to mediate disputes between states over who has the best right to glom onto every penny of income they can identify in the hands of people who are energetic enough to earn money in interstate commerce--but I suppose they've been facing that issue for a long time now, given that most states already have a system of interstate credits in place. Ah, for the days when I paid income tax to California, New Jersey, and the State and City of New York while living in (income-tax-free) Texas. I'm sure they put the money to good use.
The press is generally reporting this as problematic because Maryland counties and the city of Baltimore need lots of cash, which apparently is the only useful consideration when it comes to taxation policy or the Constitutional limits on state power. Myself, I'd worry more about having to mediate disputes between states over who has the best right to glom onto every penny of income they can identify in the hands of people who are energetic enough to earn money in interstate commerce--but I suppose they've been facing that issue for a long time now, given that most states already have a system of interstate credits in place. Ah, for the days when I paid income tax to California, New Jersey, and the State and City of New York while living in (income-tax-free) Texas. I'm sure they put the money to good use.
The Magna Carta on Trial
Really the trial will be of the barons who fought for it, I suppose, rather than the charter of liberties itself. The UK has decided to hold a trial for treason against those gentlemen, wierdly presided over by a panel that will include Justice Stephen Breyer of the United States Supreme Court.
George Washington's trial will surely follow. I suppose they're saving Justice Sotomeyer for that one.
George Washington's trial will surely follow. I suppose they're saving Justice Sotomeyer for that one.
Do What Now?
Mikey Weinstein, CEO of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, has sent a blistering letter to Chief of Staff Gen, Mark Welsh, arguing that Olson's comments violate an Air Force instruction, which prohibits airmen from endorsing a particular faith or belief.I'm not a JAG lawyer -- perhaps Joel or Joesph W. is around? -- but I'm pretty sure it's OK to pray in uniform. Not only are there designated chaplains, but in Iraq I constantly saw groups of soldiers gathering in circles to pray before going outside the wire to do route clearance or dismounted patrols. Who's going to claim soldiers ought not to pray before such a mission?
"Olson's highly publicized, sectarian speech is nothing less than a brutal disgrace to the very uniform he was wearing and the solemn oath he took to support and defend the United States Constitution," Weinstein writes.
But here's the letter, and this is what they claim he's done wrong:
2.12. Balance of Free Exercise of Religion and Establishment Clause. Leaders at all levels must balance constitutional protections for their own free exercise of religion, including individual expressions of religious beliefs, and the constitutional prohibition against governmental establishment of religion. They must ensure their words and actions cannot reasonably be construed to be officially endorsing or disapproving of, or extending preferential treatment for any faith, belief, or absence of belief. (emphasis added)So the claim is that his remarks at a prayer service constitute a felony for which he ought to be imprisoned (since that is 'the fullest extent' of punishment licensed for these 'unforgivable crimes').
In light of your very own Air Force regulation, irrefutably on point with the matter herein, and the violation of which is proscribed as a potential FELONY under the Uniform Code of Military Justice, do you honestly NOT see any incredibly serious problems here with Olson’s statements, Mark? Please also note the controlling holding of the seminal 1974 Supreme Court case of Parker vs. Levy (417 U.S. 733), penned by Chief Justice William Rehnquist, significantly limiting the Constitutional rights of active duty military members (such as Major General Olson) vs. the same rights enjoyed by their American civilian counterparts....
Consequently, on behalf of itself and its over 41,000 active duty and veteran armed forces clients, the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) hereby demands that Major General Craig S. Olson be immediately, aggressively and very visibly brought to justice for his unforgivable crimes and transgressions via trial by General Courts Martial and that any and all others who assisted him with his NDPTF speech of fundamentalist Christian supremacy be likewise investigated and punished to the full extent of military law.
Now, this is a letter posted to the internet by crackpots. Still, how strange to see the lines drawn this way by any American. It's hard to believe that this makes sense to any of our countrymen at all.
Speaking of law and order
Time for a national conversation about what society is supposed to do when violent lawlessness becomes hard to ignore? Looks like the current trend is to run it through a race filter before we decide whether and how to crack down:
The Obama administration announced Monday it will ban federal transfers of certain types of military-style gear from local police departments, as the president seeks to respond to a spate of incidents that has frayed trust in communities across the country.
The banned items include tracked armored vehicles, bayonets and grenade launchers, according to a task force report released by the White House. Other equipment, including tactical vehicles, explosives and riot equipment, will be transferred only if local police provide additional certification and assurances that the gear will be used responsibly, according to the report.
The announcement came as Obama prepared to travel to Camden, N.J., to highlight his administration’s strategy to help reform local police departments, including efforts to increase the numbers of officers on patrol and the use of body cameras.It's true the announcement doesn't mention race, but when I read "reform local police departments" (not mention "communities") in a statement coming from the White House recently, that's where my head goes. Something tells me the President isn't losing sleep over the potential use of tactical vehicles in Waco. Speaking which, are those Special Forces guys still hanging out in Texas?
Waco Goes Wild West
Speaking of Mad Max, there was some real Sons of Anarchy action this weekend: nine dead and eighteen injured (no bystanders or cops) at what's being described as a five-gang battle at a "Twin Peaks" restaurant on Highway 35. Police closed down the whole market area that included the Twin Peaks franchise, as well as some downtown streets and two bridges over the Brazos River.
That's more casualties than I usually expect from a news item about a dust-up. These guys weren't just blowing off steam in a fight that got a little out of hand: there was concentrated and effective murder.
The emphasis in a lot of reports is on "bikers," but I'd put it on "gangs." Waco does appear to respond aggressively to this kind of thing. There's certainly no talk of "space to destroy."
That's more casualties than I usually expect from a news item about a dust-up. These guys weren't just blowing off steam in a fight that got a little out of hand: there was concentrated and effective murder.
The emphasis in a lot of reports is on "bikers," but I'd put it on "gangs." Waco does appear to respond aggressively to this kind of thing. There's certainly no talk of "space to destroy."
Mad Max Is Not A Feminist
Andrew Klavan writes that critics are praising the new Mad Max because it upholds the feminist ideal. I think he's quite wrong that it does any such thing. Here's his argument.
....while I consider feminism a dishonest and oppressive philosophy, I believe good feminist stories can be told. This is because even a philosophy that is a lie in general may be the truth in a specific, individual case and stories are individual and specific. Dishonest outlooks can produce honest stories. The left has been living off this fact for decades.I've complained often enough about the need for female warriors in contemporary movies, but they're less unbelievable in movies set at or near the modern period in which guns are available. Nevertheless, the new Mad Max is not at all a feminist film. I'll put the counterargument after the jump so as to keep you from encountering spoilers.
So while ideologically corrupt critics are going wild over Fury Road because it’s feminist, I’m not criticizing it because I’m anti-feminist. I’m criticizing it because it’s not very good. Its title character is ill-defined. His mission is emotionally muddy....
What Fury Road does have is a female warrior (played by the always-watchable Charlize Theron) who does the work that any good story would have reserved for its central character. She has a back story that matters. She performs the major action tasks. She travels over a personal arc within the plot. Some in Hollywood fear that female action leads bomb. So Fury Road sneaks the female lead in by giving the female sidekick all the good stuff to do. As a result, however, the center of the movie is empty and the story collapses into it.
Justice as Fairness
Anthropologists studying hunter-gatherer societies have long know that such societies don't split off into family groups as obviously as do more settled and prosperous societies. They've come up with an answer: the relative equality of power distribution in such societies stops that from happening. Why?
I would tell you what Aristotle said about that from a position much closer to the dawn of civilization, but you can probably already guess: that justice means something besides mere equality of suffering. It might have something to do with structuring a society to enable pursuing and sometimes even actually achieving the excellences of which human nature is capable.
Those ideas are somewhat out of favor at the moment. I'm very much interested in democratizing the idea, so that people who are ordinary working class people can have access to the things they need to pursue excellence if they work hard and honestly. I'd like to see society structured in such a way that people are less likely to be rewarded for catering to lower desires, where virtue is rewarded and vice is not. All the same I think that, surely, examples like this ought to call into question the idea that justice is in any way reducible to fairness. I'm not sure that fairness is even a proper part of justice, though I haven't made up my mind that it isn't either. Whether or not fairness is in any way part of justice, it's certainly not the whole.
First author of the study, Mark Dyble (UCL Anthropology), said: "While previous researchers have noted the low relatedness of hunter-gatherer bands, our work offers an explanation as to why this pattern emerges. It is not that individuals are not interested in living with kin. Rather, if all individuals seek to live with as many kin as possible, no-one ends up living with many kin at all."So it's a lot more fair that modern society, because in a hunter-gatherer society they all want the same thing but nobody gets it. Justice, at least on the contemporary model of justice-as-fairness, was achieved before the dawn of civilization! One wonders why we ever walked away from such a paradise.
I would tell you what Aristotle said about that from a position much closer to the dawn of civilization, but you can probably already guess: that justice means something besides mere equality of suffering. It might have something to do with structuring a society to enable pursuing and sometimes even actually achieving the excellences of which human nature is capable.
Those ideas are somewhat out of favor at the moment. I'm very much interested in democratizing the idea, so that people who are ordinary working class people can have access to the things they need to pursue excellence if they work hard and honestly. I'd like to see society structured in such a way that people are less likely to be rewarded for catering to lower desires, where virtue is rewarded and vice is not. All the same I think that, surely, examples like this ought to call into question the idea that justice is in any way reducible to fairness. I'm not sure that fairness is even a proper part of justice, though I haven't made up my mind that it isn't either. Whether or not fairness is in any way part of justice, it's certainly not the whole.
Forgiveness, Fatherhood, and Mad Max
A great deal of this strikes me as wholesome.
What does fatherhood mean to you?There's a lot of swearing if you follow the link. Doesn't bother me at all, but I'm kind of enamored with the idea that there's a time and place for it. This is probably as good a place as any, but when you post to the Internet you can't be sure of the time.
There's such a blissful sense of otherness that I can't remember what it was like to not have children. I used to think a lot about myself. I still do, I guess. I mean, I have the capacity to indulge in myself. My primary relationship was with myself, and that was interrupted irrevocably when I found out I was going to be a father. It cut out so much... from my head. There was the idea that in order to look after someone else, you must first truly look after yourself. I need to be fit and good to go and get [things] done. I was healthy and already had a lot... behind me—rehab and all that—but I didn't have an anchor. A child is an anchor. And it gets heavy. Is your son going to be a reflection of you? Fear of becoming your father. And then the fear of not becoming your father. All of these conversations which were nice to think about and hypothesize about before are now immediately connected. . . .You can't un-have a son.
You can't un-have a father, either.
All of that stuff with your father falls by the wayside as you realize how inept you can be as a father yourself. And you can't really beat on your parents. I used to have a lot of hang-ups—legitimate hang-ups—about my parents. But then I dialed back the clock. My old man must have been 28 or 30 when he had me—he must have been... terrified. You only have yourself to measure from. A lot of stuff I had to forgive. I wasn't going to move forward in a healthy manner if I didn't start letting go of some pretty major stuff—stuff which held me back while I was young. Serves no purpose any longer now that I'm a father myself. It's impossible to be perfect, you discover. I look back at the flaws of my father and the things that made me say, "I won't do this, and I won't do that. I'm going to do this differently." There's no difference between my dad and me as a dad. I'm becoming my father in some ways, and I'm grateful for that. By no means am I a great father, but fatherhood has helped me focus on what I need to do to become a better man.
How did Britain Get a Prime Minister?
John Derbyshire spells it out for us.
In those days the monarch was still a force in ruling Britain. He could, in theory at least, dissolve the actual government and form a new one more to his taste. There had, however, been a change of dynasty in 1714. Queen Anne, the last of the Stuarts, had failed to produce an heir despite having endured seventeen pregnancies.... The law required a Protestant monarch, so Anne’s nearest Protestant relative, the German George of Hanover, was shipped over to be George I....Accident of history, then, brought on by preferring a Protestant to an Englishman. Or a Briton, I suppose, since the more recent kings had been Scots.
Unfortunately George I couldn’t speak English. He had rehearsed a little speech to make when he landed in England, to reassure the English that he had come for the good of all. He got the grammar mangled though, and proclaimed: “I haff come for all your goods!”
Unable to follow the debates of his ministers in the council chamber, George got bored and stopped showing up. Walpole, already the alpha male among the King’s advisers, took over the vacant chair.
Mad Max
So if any of you were thinking of going to see the new Mad Max, I went. It's a pretty amazing two hours. Heavy Metal acts push a line between hardcore and absurd, and they always risk pushing just a little too far and becoming ridiculous. This movie pushes just as far as you possibly could, but if it crosses the line it does it only in a few moments that are so intense that you've probably lost precision in your bearings.
Joe Bob Briggs will give it an awesome review someday.
Jesus as Ideal Ranger
Those of you who know the famous RANGER! video ("You'll fight tigers!") will remember that it included among famous Rangers Jesus Christ. In a new book, Chaplain Captain John McDougall of the 2nd Ranger Battalion, 75th Ranger Regiment, attempts to make the point with more seriousness.
The second thought is that there is a kind of validity to the move. As the perfect man, all things proper to men are fully realized in Christ. This change in emphasis of focus isn't changing Jesus in the same way that Fafhrd was changing Issek: it's merely attending to a different aspect than before. The danger to the move is that in focusing on areas where men are already strong, it draws their attention from what Christianity can best help them with: recognizing and confessing to the areas where they are weak. Perhaps it's a good approach, still, insofar as it builds a trusting relationship between man and God. Confession is easiest where trust is deepest.
“As I drove up the Cascade Mountains, I started thinking about how much my Rangers resembled Jesus – selflessly willing to give their lives for other,” McDougall said. “God took this simple thought and then inspired me to write an entire allegory about how Jesus was like an Airborne Ranger.”I have two competing thoughts about this. The first one is that it mirrors almost precisely the tactic Fafhrd used in Lean Times in Lankhmar to address the unpopularity of his chosen diety:
McDougall, a United States Military Academy graduate, recently published Jesus was an Airborne Ranger, a faith-based illustration of the warrior ethos of Jesus Christ’s ministry in relation to the mentality and characteristics of the members of the 75th Ranger Regiment.
McDougall, who has served as 2d Ranger Battalion’s Chaplain for three years, was inspired to write the book when he realized that his Rangers were generally unaware of the strength of Jesus as depicted in the Bible.
“My desire to write the book came from the realization that the Jesus of many churches is a weakling – someone that our Rangers cannot relate too,” McDougall said. “I wanted to introduce them to the Warrior Christ that I see in the Bible – someone bold, disciplined and unafraid.”
As delivered over and over by Fafhrd, the History of Issek of the Jug gradually altered, by small steps which even Bwadres could hardly cavil at had he wished, into something considerably more like the saga of a Northern hero, though toned down in some respects. Issek had not slain dragons and other monsters as a child—that would have been against his Creed—he had only sported with them, swimming with leviathan, frisking with behemoth, and flying through the trackless spaces of air on the backs of wivern, griffin and hippogryph. Nor had Issek as a man scattered kings and emperors in battle, he had merely dumbfounded them and their quaking ministers by striding about on fields of poisoned sword-points, standing at attention in fiery furnaces, and treading water in tanks of boiling oil—all the while delivering majestic sermons on brotherly love in perfect, intricately rhymed stanzas.Fritz Leiber was playfully mocking the actual course of alterations of the tone of the Gospel stories as Christianity spread north into lands that had been less Roman and more barbarian. It worked very well at the time, and might work again (as indeed it worked for Fafhrd in the tale).
The second thought is that there is a kind of validity to the move. As the perfect man, all things proper to men are fully realized in Christ. This change in emphasis of focus isn't changing Jesus in the same way that Fafhrd was changing Issek: it's merely attending to a different aspect than before. The danger to the move is that in focusing on areas where men are already strong, it draws their attention from what Christianity can best help them with: recognizing and confessing to the areas where they are weak. Perhaps it's a good approach, still, insofar as it builds a trusting relationship between man and God. Confession is easiest where trust is deepest.
Precision is Beautiful
Food, cut into 2.5cm cubes. Surprisingly beautiful for a piece of modern art, but I suppose nature gets most of the credit here. The art of imposing an exactly-similar external form only highlights the beauty of the natural differences.
Yep: Insecurity is the Issue
This just proves that today’s outrage culture and offensensitivity (to use a wonderful term coined by Berke Breathed in Bloom County nearly three decades ago) is self-immolating by its very nature. It demands a lock-step groupthink and punishes any criticism as bigotry or worse. It’s the exact opposite of both tolerance and plurality, plus the nature of this particular offense — calling someone by their first name? — exposes the high degree of insecurity among those involved in the debate, and their desperation to shut their critics up, even if it’s the most progressive President since LBJ.Sometimes people say really offensive things, and on those occasions genuine offense can be warranted. But we often see outrageous outrage coming from two additional classes of people:
1) People who are really insecure.
2) People attempting to leverage victim status to obtain some advantage.
A lot of criticism focuses on type (2) cases, but I think type (1) cases are actually the most common. There are just tons of people walking around in constant fear of being looked down upon because they don't really think much of themselves. This is sometimes true even of people who have actually achieved quite a bit -- say, becoming a Senator after gaining tenure after earning a Ph.D., all of which are substantial accomplishments. There's a named psychological disorder associated with it, and some believe women are especially susceptible to it.
Under those circumstances, a highly confident man like the President can provoke outrage by saying things that would be completely inoffensive to someone with more self-confidence. Calling someone by their first name? He does that to Senators all the time. He used to be a Senator himself, and it's part of the culture of comity even among political opponents.
I suppose the rebuttal would be that sexism in society is so prevalent that it's our collective fault that high-achieving women like these sometimes feel sensitive to criticism. Certainly the society doesn't adhere to my own standards as to what I consider ordinary decent respect for women in day to day life. The way to make a road forward isn't by setting up a bunch of eggshells for people to walk on when talking about high-achieving women ("Don't use her first name!"). That's just going to reinforce the idea that women need special protections if they're going to get out in the world.
Certainly I always try to encourage women in my life to be confident and to take honest pride in their achievements. Mostly I do this because I like them, but there's a small element of self
Probably they make better Senators.
Comin' Down the Grade, Makin' 90 Miles an Hour...
....watch Ol' 97 roll.
If you're interested in the story of the real 'Old 97,' it's an interesting one too.
An Amtrak train that derailed near Philadelphia was apparently traveling at more than 100 miles per hour at the time of the crash, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) said Wednesday.... Seven peopled were killed and more than 100 injured during the crash.
If you're interested in the story of the real 'Old 97,' it's an interesting one too.
The noises we make
More from Jesperson's "Language": just as we call birds by their sounds, cultures develop names for foreign visitors that reflect their characteristic verbal tics:
A special subdivision of particular interest comprises those names, or nicknames, which are sometimes popularly given to nations from words continually occurring in their speech. Thus the French used to call an Englishman a god-damn (godon), and in China an English soldier is called a-says or I-says. In Java a Frenchman is called orang-deedong (orang 'man'), in America ding-dong, and during the Napoleonic wars the French were called in Spain didones, from dis-donc; another name for the same nation is wi-wi (Australia), man-a-wiwi (in Beach-la-mar), or oui-men (New Caledonia). In Eleonore Christine's Jammersminde 83 I read, "Ich habe zwei parle mi franço gefangen," and correspondingly Goldsmith writes (Globe ed. 624): "Damn the French, the parle vous, and all that belongs to them. What makes the bread rising? the parle vous that devour us." In Rovigno the surrounding Slavs are called čuje from their exclamation čuje 'listen, I say,' and in Hungary German visitors are called vigéc (from wie geht's?), and customs officers vartapiszli (from wart' a bissl). Round Panama everything native is called spiggoty, because in the early days the Panamanians, when addressed, used to reply, "No spiggoty [speak] Inglis." In Yokohama an English or American sailor is called Damuraīsu H'to from 'Damn your eyes' and Japanese H'to 'people.'
And that's the good news
"Junk," with a negative outlook: that's how Moody's characterizes Chicago's bond rating. In other words, "That's as good as it gets, and it's never going to get that good again."
Old Time Color
Following a rendition of "Rye Whiskey," Woody Guthrie is asked to give some off-color toasts he might have heard. It's an interesting exchange, compared to what you are more likely to hear today.
Aristotle for Everybody
This sounds like a neat little book -- it's 200 pages, but for a summary of Aristotle that is pretty short.
H/t: Brandywine Books.
....accessible not only to the average reader but also to children in middle school. That ambition is what Mortimer Adler aimed at with this book. His thirteen year-old and his eleven year-old read the manuscript and gave helpful feedback, so he certainly thinks it is a success.You could do worse, and hardly better, than to acquaint yourself with the Master.
H/t: Brandywine Books.
Habeas Corpus
Soon after the agency’s contractors began their program of “enhanced interrogation’’ at the secret black site in Thailand – placing him in a coffin-size box; slamming him against wall; depriving him of sleep; bombarding him with loud music; as well as waterboarding – they sent an encrypted cable to Washington.It would be nice if the court would explain itself, at least in broad and general terms, to the American people. Courts are not political branches, at least in theory, but their workings should not be opaque to the sovereign. Accepting some need for government secrecy in matters of national security, nevertheless an explanation for this strange case that redacts what is necessary should be possible. We ought to know, and approve, the justification for such a major exception from our rule.
The CIA interrogators said that if Zubaydah died during questioning, his body would be cremated. But if he survived the ordeal, the interrogators wanted assurances that he would “remain in isolation and incommunicado for the remainder of his life.”
Senior officials gave the assurances. Zubaydah, a Saudi citizen, “will never be placed in a situation where he has any significant contact with others and/or has the opportunity to be released,” the head of the CIA’s ALEC Station, the code name of the Washington-based unit hunting Osama bin Laden, replied. “All major players are in concurrence,” the cable said, that he “should remain incommunicado for the remainder of his life.”
What Could Possibly Go Wrong?
With a little molecular tinkering, for the first time scientists have created chicken embryos with broad, Velociraptor-like muzzles in the place of their beaks.I think I've seen this movie.
Free Speech & Hate Speech
VDH points out a clever trick.
Goodness knows I detest the Westboro Baptist Church. If we can ask the families of fallen American servicemembers to endure them at the funerals of their children, who died for our country, we can endure pretty much any sort of 'hate speech.'
President Obama scapegoated Nakoula at the United Nations — a majority of whose members ban free speech as a rule — with pompous promises that the prophet would not be mocked with impunity in the United States of America. Nakoula was suddenly arrested on a minor parole violation and jailed for over a year. No one seemed to care that the unsavory firebrand Egyptian had a constitutional right while legally resident in America to freely caricature any religion that he chose.Emphasis added.
The IRS under career bureaucrats like Lois Lerner targeted non-profit groups on the basis of their perceived political expression. The best strategy now for stifling free speech is to arbitrarily substitute the word “hate” for “free” — and then suddenly we all must unite to curb “hate speech.”
Goodness knows I detest the Westboro Baptist Church. If we can ask the families of fallen American servicemembers to endure them at the funerals of their children, who died for our country, we can endure pretty much any sort of 'hate speech.'
No Secret Treaties
Republicans seem to be preparing to save the President's bacon on two trade bills, neither of which should be even remotely considered for passage until they have been declassified and studied by the American people. If it's such a great deal, let us read it. Let us discuss it. Let us write letters to our representatives so they know what we think about it, whether we support or oppose it, and just why.
No secret treaties.
UPDATE: Salon magazine on the President's "lies," their term. Indeed, it's their point.
UPDATE: Boom.
No secret treaties.
UPDATE: Salon magazine on the President's "lies," their term. Indeed, it's their point.
It’s beneath the dignity of the Presidency to so aggressively paint opponents as not just wrong on the facts, but hiding the truth on purpose. Warren has responded without using the same indecorous tactics. Unfortunately, I don’t have the same self-control. So by way of response, here are ten moments where the President or his subordinates have lied – call it “misled” or “offered half-truths” or whatever; but I’m in an ornery mood so let’s just say lied – about his trade agenda[.]Last night I was talking with a left-leaning professor I know, and he expressed astonishment at the President's rhetoric on the subject.
UPDATE: Boom.
Senate Democrats on Tuesday delivered a stinging blow to President Obama’s trade agenda by voting to prevent the chamber from picking up fast-track legislation.
A motion to cut off a filibuster and proceed to the trade bill fell short of a 60-vote hurdle, 52-45. Sen. Tom Carper (Del.) was the only Democrat to back it.
Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) switched his vote from yes to no to reserve his ability to return to the measure at a later date.
Fast-track is a top legislative priority for the White House, but it has run into significant Senate opposition that has been led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.).
It faces even more opposition from Democrats in the House, and the surprise Senate failure will raise doubts about whether the legislation will make its way through Congress.
Reading Aquinas
A reflection.
For me personally, there’s also a kind of ponderous clarity and simplicity about Aquinas’s writing that gets more and more attractive as I spend time with it. He’s not the kind of thinker who wants to complicate things or show off his brilliance—he just wants to make sense of the world the best he can, within the limitations of the human mind.
Beyond 'Starve the Beast,' Kill the Monster
The regulatory state has two related weaknesses... It relies on voluntary compliance, and its enforcement capabilities are far inferior to its expansive mandate. So he proposes a private legal defense fund — the “Madison Fund,” honoring the father of the Constitution — that businesses and citizens can rely on for representation against federal regulators. By engaging in expensive and time-consuming litigation on behalf of clients that refuse to comply with pointless rules, the fund drains the government’s enforcement resources and eventually undercuts its ambitions. The state can compel submission from an individual or company with the threat of ruinous legal proceedings, Murray writes, “but Goliath cannot afford to make good on that threat against hundreds of Davids.”
Mesopotamia
The 'land between the rivers' takes on a new meaning, at an hour when the rivers are these:
1) We need to talk about the danger posed by violent, apocalyptic Islam.
2) We need to make sure we don't paint Islam per se as the problem.
Historian Timothy R. Furnish has a good piece on that topic. I liked the SNL bit, too, though.
That's a good way of at least beginning to acknowledge the elephant in the room: the fear that many 'right-thinking' people feel when they are asked to address this topic. There's a huge difference between the virtue of charity towards strangers, and the vices of dishonesty and cowardice. It's only the brave who can truly be charitable here. It is only those of us who are not afraid who can extend a kind and honest hand. First, you must be brave.
1) We need to talk about the danger posed by violent, apocalyptic Islam.
2) We need to make sure we don't paint Islam per se as the problem.
Historian Timothy R. Furnish has a good piece on that topic. I liked the SNL bit, too, though.
That's a good way of at least beginning to acknowledge the elephant in the room: the fear that many 'right-thinking' people feel when they are asked to address this topic. There's a huge difference between the virtue of charity towards strangers, and the vices of dishonesty and cowardice. It's only the brave who can truly be charitable here. It is only those of us who are not afraid who can extend a kind and honest hand. First, you must be brave.
Civics
Here's the huge problem:
Three out of five eighth graders tested in a nationwide survey did not know that the 1803 Marbury v. Madison case established the Supreme Court’s power to decide whether a federal law is constitutional. Half of them could not attribute the phrase “We hold these truths to be self-evident” to the Declaration of Independence.... Only about a third of American eighth-graders can correctly separate which presidential powers are set forth in the Constitution from those not specified in the Constitution.I know that all of you, like me, periodically quiz other Americans you care about to see how many of the amendments in the Bill of Rights they can explain. In general my experience is that people can identify three or four of the five freedoms specified in the First, know the Second, and are fuzzy on the rest of it.
Time's arrow
From Otto Jesperson's 1922 "Language," on the enduring difficulty of evaluating processes of natural evolution in terms of either progress or decay:
To men fresh from the ordinary grammar-school training, no language would seem really respectable that had not four or five distinct cases and three genders, or that had less than five tenses and as many moods in its verbs. Accordingly, such poor languages as had either lost much of their original richness in grammatical forms (e.g. French, English, or Danish), or had never had any, so far as one knew (e.g. Chinese), were naturally looked upon with something of the pity bestowed on relatives in reduced circumstances, or the contempt felt for foreign paupers. . . . [A] language possesses an inestimable charm if its phonetic system remains unimpaired and its etymologies are transparent; but pliancy of the material of language and flexibility to express ideas is really no less an advantage; everything depends on the point of view: the student of architecture has one point of view, the people who are to live in the house another.
I may here anticipate the results of the following investigation and say that in all those instances in which we are able to examine the history of any language for a sufficient length of time, we find that languages have a progressive tendency. But if languages progress towards greater perfection, it is not in a bee-line, nor are all the changes we witness to be considered steps in the right direction. The only thing I maintain is that the sum total of these changes, when we compare a remote period with the present time, shows a surplus of progressive over retrogressive or indifferent changes, so that the structure of modern languages is nearer perfection than that of ancient languages, if we take them as wholes instead of picking out at random some one or other more or less significant detail. And of course it must not be imagined that progress has been achieved through deliberate acts of men conscious that they were improving their mother-tongue. On the contrary, many a step in advance has at first been a slip or even a blunder, and, as in other fields of human activity, good results have only been won after a good deal of bungling and 'muddling along.' My attitude towards this question is the same as that of Leslie Stephen, who writes in a letter (Life 454): "I have a perhaps unreasonable amount of belief, not in a millennium, but in the world on the whole blundering rather forwards than backwards."
Schleicher on one occasion used the fine simile: "Our words, as contrasted with Gothic words, are like a statue that has been rolling for a long time in the bed of a river till its beautiful limbs have been worn off, so that now scarcely anything remains but a polished stone cylinder with faint indications of what it once was" (D 34). Let us turn the tables by asking: Suppose, however, that it would be quite out of the question to place the statue on a pedestal to be admired; what if, on the one hand, it was not ornamental enough as a work of art, and if, on the other hand, human well-being was at stake if it was not serviceable in a rolling-mill: which would then be the better--a rugged and unwieldy statue, making difficulties at every rotation, or an even, smooth, easygoing and well-oiled roller?
Happy Mother's Day
"Where would any of us be, without a woman? Why, even Father Lonergan had a mother."
Two on Ben Carson
Ben Carson, running for President, has decided to break with the rest of the Republican field and endorse a minimum wage increase. Meanwhile, he is chided for taking his claim to be 'politically incorrect' too far.
Political correctness is dangerous when it discourages thought or expression. But simply declaring oneself "politically incorrect" — as Carson pridefully does — is not a license to throw off the shackles of protocol and politeness and say crazy, offensive things.That's right. He should say "With all due respect" instead.
A Quiz for Eric Blair
On Roman History.
While you're there, read this article on the Fall of Rome.
While you're there, read this article on the Fall of Rome.
Roman historians recognized what they considered to be a decay in the traditional Roman character from the late Republic onwards. Symptoms included a falling birth-rate, a growing gap between rich and poor, and declining attachment to ancient traditions. Modern historians have tended to focus on economic and political changes, but this new theory suggests that the root cause was, in fact, a mass change in temperament driven by prosperity.Sounds familiar.
The UK Goes Right
Sorry to see Farage go, but George Galloway will not be missed. I like that a wave of nationalism swept the UK in response to the Labour attempt to flood the country with immigrants who would permanently change the face of the electorate. That augurs well for a similar (and even more deserved) wave election here.
The Scottish National Party swept the Old Country.
The Scottish National Party swept the Old Country.
Patience is a Virtue
A US Army colonel goes on C-SPAN, with hilarious very sad results. Kudos to Col. Petkosek for putting up with the callers.
Voice of the Mighty 9th
My Representative, Doug Collins, on religious freedom and the void that used to be the Constitution.
Return From the Wild
I have returned from five days in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. During this time I crossed Clingman's Dome on the Appalachian Trail, which is the highest point of the trail from Georgia to Maine and which is attained by first surmounting Mount Love or Mount Baldwin and then crossing a ridge to the next summit. I also hiked the aptly named Death Ridge, and then descended into the lower regions of the park to enjoy the water features. Saw every species of big game native the the park, including elk and a bear I had to stand off of his kill (of a wild boar) in order to make a narrow and precipitous trail clear for passage.
Google's auto-editing program did this with one of my photos:
Overall, fifty miles or so of backpacking through some credibly difficult terrain. It was a beautiful place, just as you'd imagine.
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