Hitchens Cont

Hitchens on "The Topic of Cancer":

The man continues to write very well, and with great courage. It's hard not to admire and like someone who is so willing to encounter the world.

The notorious stage theory of Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, whereby one progresses from denial to rage through bargaining to depression and the eventual bliss of “acceptance,” hasn’t so far had much application in my case. In one way, I suppose, I have been “in denial” for some time, knowingly burning the candle at both ends and finding that it often gives a lovely light.

As indeed it does. I likewise will be poorly placed to complain if I should find that fate has dealt me some similar illness. It's something I think about from time to time; frankly, I don't expect to live to be very old.

But I also think about Sir Lancelot, after the tournament in which he bore the shield of the brother of the Lily Maid of Astolat instead of his own. He had taken that shield in order to fool his cousins into not recognizing him, so he could have the pleasure of striking them down. Thereby he was badly wounded by a man who would have held his hand if he had known him, and who came to him in his sickbed to apologize. But Lancelot said:

“I have the same I sought, for I would with pride have overcome you all. And there in my pride I was near slain, and that was in my own fault, for I might have given you warning of my being there, and then I had no hurt…. Therefore, fair cousin,” said Sir Lancelot, “let this language overpass, and all shall be welcome that God sends.”

That's a statement of tremendous courage, although Sir Thomas Malory wrote it from a position of knowledge. I salute Mr. Hitchens, who does well and boldly in that terrible valley we all must traverse.

Great Moments in Campaign Slogans

Great Moments in Campaign Slogans

Sharron Angle isn't turning out to be a very good candidate, but I've got to hand it to her on her newest line: “Harry Reid’s Plan to Save the Nevada Economy: Coked-up Stimulus Monkeys.” She's referring, of course, to a report to be released soon by Sens. Tom Coburn and John McCain the 100 most ridiculous stimulus-funding projects, which will include a study of the effect of cocaine on monkeys, new windows for a closed visitor center, and modern dance as a tool for software development.

Great News on the Gulf

Great News

The AP says everything's fine in the Gulf now, move along, nothing to see here. A full 75% of the Deepwater spill was skimmed, burned, evaporated, or otherwise disposed of by a kindly Mother Nature. Of the commenters to this press release in the Houston Chronicle asks, if we drop Washington, D.C., into the ocean, will 75% of it go away?

Not What the Patients Ordered

Not What the Patients Ordered

From "Dave in Texas" at Ace: Missouri has held the

first of 3 (I think) state referendums on Obamacare, to amend state law to "deny the government authority to 'penalize citizens for refusing to purchase private health insurance or infringe upon the right to offer or accept direct payment for lawful healthcare services." Last month a Missouri judge rejected a challenge to remove Prop C from the ballot.

We know what Pete Stark thinks. Here's hoping Missouri sends DC a big "oh, well then allow us to retort."

The results as of late Tuesday evening? With nearly half of precincts reporting, YES: 75.6% NO: 24.4%. Three to one against.

Dave in Texas predicts that tomorrow's spin will be "what's wrong with Missouri?" But you can't tell me a lot of incumbents aren't feeling a pucker.

Old Hickory

Old Hickory:

Distinctive Unit Insignia of the "Old Hickory" Brigade, 30th HBCT

Major Joel Leggett drops by to mention, in the comments to one of the posts below, an apparent Glenn Beck assault on Andrew Jackson. I don't watch TV or listen to the radio, so I tend to miss Mr. Beck unless his remarks get excerpted on a blog somewhere. This sounds fairly foolish.

I just happened to catch Beck’s announcement that he is putting together a special wherein he will lay the blame for America’s initial wrong turn on Andrew Jackson and the idea of Manifest Destiny, a concept Beck believes put us on the path to a secular man oriented world view vice the God centered idea of “Divine Providence.” What a load of crap.

To begin with, the term “Manifest Destiny” was not even coined until 1839, two years after Jackson’s administration ended. It did not even come into popular usage until the 1840s. How on earth could Andrew Jackson be responsible for the concept of Manifest Destiny as described by Beck. I guess it is possible that Beck thinks the Westward advancement that occurred under Jackson’s administration proves his point. But if that is the case why not blame Jefferson as the father of Manifest Destiny. It was Jefferson who was responsible for the Louisiana Purchase, the event credited with opening the West for settlement.

We can go back further than that, and ask about Mr. Washington's intentions. He dispatched generals Lachlan McIntosh and Daniel Brodhead west during the war to establish a line of forts designed to open the west to his forces, and allow them to attack British strongholds. Their successor, John Gibson, used those forts as a base for expansion into what is now Indiana, of which he became acting territorial governor and Secretary of the Territory under President John Adams. Why were we expanding into Indiana?

I'm also not sure where Mr. Beck is getting the idea that there was a Christian Age in pre-Jacksonian American politics. If anything, the reverse is true: Jackson rode the tide of a populist revolt into the White House. His small-town, backcountry supporters were much more likely to be intensely Christian than the Founding Fathers had been. Jackson himself was a Presbyterian, which in those days was still the stern, Scots-Irish, Calvinist sort of religion that it has largely ceased to be in the last generation. That was one of the complaints against him in 'polite society' during his administration; and indeed, it's fair to say that 'polite society' gave him more trouble than the British Army ever did.

The Tax Worm Ouroboros

The Tax Worm Ouroboros

As reported at NBCWashington (h/t HotAir), the District of Columbia funds a Summer Youth Employment Program relies on a $23 million annual budget to hire about 20,000 young residents of the District for various minimum wage summer jobs. The program overspends this budget every year. This year's 50% budget overrun prompted the D.C. auditor to complain and the D.C. Mayor to suggest -- wait for it -- expanding the program for an additional week, using, in part, other funds that had been earmarked for the homeless.

None of this is the real story, though. The amazing part is that all the furor exposed the fact that SYEP funds were being used to send "participants to attend a Council oversight session at which they lobbied for more funding for the program." No doubt D.C. political critters find this reasonable. As Michelle Malkin notes about this charming boondoggle, minimum wage laws devastate the youth employment rates, while government make-work jobs initiatives simply redistribute the unemployment. But surely when the jobs initiatives consist of hiring unemployed youth to lobby for additional funds for jobs for unemployed youth, we've closed a very neat circle.

It's hard to see how it's very different, on its small scale, from government workers forming unions that lobby for high pay and benefits for government workers.

It's Not Partisan If We're Doing It

A Time to Fight

A new article by George Parker in The New Yorker decries "partisanship" in the U.S. Senate from the point of view that the core mission of the Senate is the fundamental reform of American society. For Parker, partisanship means holding back progress for base political gain. Predictably, he finds partisanship an evil and baffling habit.

For this kind of mournful piece, the first step is to evoke the Golden Age. There is the traditional recourse to Alexis de Tocqueville, who in 1832 praised the Senate's "lofty thoughts" and "generous instincts." After the Civil War, unfortunately, with brief shining moments of "spasms of legislation" under Wilson and FDR, the Senate became “the dam against which the waves of social reform dashed themselves in vain—the chief obstructive force in the federal government.”

Parker interviews an impressive variety of Senators and staff. Although he throws in the occasional admission that "Democrats have been known to do it too," his story is mostly a long jeremiad against the new breed of hardcore Republican partisans who inexplicably use every rule and procedure in the Senate book to block heroic, forward-thinking legislation. “We find ourselves at a moment in our history when the questions are huge ones, not small ones, and where things have been put off for a really long period of time,” mourned Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va). “Yet you have a Senate that’s designed not to advance change but to slow it.” Parker describes the ugly process that led to ObamaCare without a trace of irony, seeming to view it as the triumph of good legislation over baffling obstruction. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill, Democratic Party Whip) said, “I was stunned that only four Republicans would join us in passing this historic [financial regulation] legislation. What does it take to bring the Republican Party into the conversation about the future of America?” Well, just at a guess, perhaps it would take . . . proposing solutions that appealed to a broad majority of voters? In some cases, that can even muster a bare majority of voters?

Parker is deeply disappointed that the Senate reform engine likely has run out of steam. "The two lasting achievements of this Senate, financial regulation and health care, required a year and a half of legislative warfare that nearly destroyed the body." He attributes the damage to partisanship. He does not imagine that the opposition party could be carrying the flag of dissent for the American public. He quotes, but does not seem to understand, Sen. Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky, Senate Minority Leader): “To the extent that [Democrats] want to do things that we think are in the political center and would be helpful to the country, we’ll be helpful. To the extent they are trying to turn us into a Western European country, we are not going to be helpful.”

Parker's sources wax nostalgic about the days when Senators formed personal bonds across party lines. “It’s awfully difficult to say crappy things about someone that you just had lunch with,” mused Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn). I'm reminded of the reports of unofficial truces between American and German forces along stagnant fronts in World War I. Mean-spirited officers broke up these heartwarming developments by periodically transferring troops to difficult posts along the line, knowing that human beings naturally form loyal bonds with people in manageably small groups after a period of prolonged contact -- and also knowing that the troops' business on the line was not to foster international goodwill and camaraderie but to win a battle for their respective countries. If the military command hadn't believed the battle was more important than the individual soldiers' diplomatic breakthroughs, they'd probably have let the soldiers go home to practice conviviality among a society of their own choosing.

I have a completely different definition of "partisanship" from Mr. Parker. What I call "partisan" is a Senator's opposition to a policy he genuinely supports, purely for the strategic advantage of damaging his opponents. An example would be Senators who support a war in the first flush of outraged patriotism, but who then begin to backpedal for fear that the public's support is making a President from the opposing party too popular and successful. What I do not call "partisan" is opposition to disastrous policies with every weapon at one's disposal. A progressive movement in this country has pushed reforms for many decades. A strong countermovement has developed among Americans who believe the reforms are wrongheaded and corrosive. As long as the progressives believe reform must be pursued at all costs, they will not confine themselves to measures that enjoy broad public support. As long as that is true, the party of resistance will fight them as if they were enemies, not colleagues.

Monuments

Monuments:

Here is the White House's chosen response to the news that a constitutional challenge to their health care mandate has been permitted by the courts.

We saw this with the Social Security Act, the Civil Rights Act, and the Voting Rights Act – constitutional challenges were brought to all three of these monumental pieces of legislation, and all of those challenges failed. So too will the challenge to health reform.

This, then, is the understanding of our opponents: Constitutional challenges are to be expected, but they will always be overcome. The Constitution isn't so important that it could stop "monumental" legislation; complaining that the Constitution does not permit something is merely a temporary holding action by the rear guard of a defeated army. It only keeps the inevitable back a short while.

Now, it is our challenge to show they are wrong. The Constitution matters. We must show that its limits do limit, and that it delegates no more than it claims to delegate.

In this cause, no sacrifice is too heavy. We are better with no Republic than with a government that burns the Constitution, one that views it only as a minor inconvenience to enacting some alternate plan.

Mair's Longsword

Mair's Longsword:

Thanks to reader B.M. who kindly sent a link to a beautifully crafted edition of Paul Mair's longsword manual, in Latin, De Arte Athletica. Note the beautiful illustrations, which show the kind of fighting foil used to simulate longswords in some places. You also see foils of this type in Joachim Meyer's work. Albion Swords makes one -- quite functional -- which is named after the latter gentleman.

Since we're on that subject, Lars, have you seen Albion's new line for Viking re-enactors?

One for Eric

One for Eric:

...who has doubtless already seen it. But just in case!

Scholars discovered the 100-yard-wide (90-metre-wide) canal at Portus, the ancient maritime port through which goods from all over the Empire were shipped to Rome for more than 400 years.

Old Friends

Old Friends:

Doc Russia writes:

The last place I drove to was the recruiter's office. The Marine recruiter was not in, and I was a little disappointed, but not surprised about. Even when I enlisted, half my lifetime ago, they were usually out visiting high schools or doing other community activities on fridays. It is unfortunate, because I wanted to tell them something. I wanted to hand them my impressive looking business card, show them pictures of my beautiful wife and adorable child. I wanted to tell them about all of the exciting things I had accomplished, the places I had gone, and the adventures I had had. This was so that they could tell these young teenagers that of all of these things which I had and had done, none of them could have happened if I had not come to this unremarkable cubicle in a non-descript office park first....

In 1993, I was a 17 year old on a bus leaving a hometown which held all the friends I held most dear to me (and still do) and headed towards an infamous swamp of an island run by the most fearsome men of history, known for only two things; the trials it inflicted and the men that survived.

Stay Home

Stay Home, Mr. President:

Georgia would just as soon you not drop by.

At least, Democrats in Georgia feel that way.

The President will fly into town Monday morning.

If you think this will be a time for Democrats running for office to rally around the chief executive- -you probably haven't been following the campaigns this summer.

Former Governor Roy Barnes will not be available to meet Mr. Obama. The Democratic gubernatorial candidate will be somewhere in Georgia- - far from Atlanta....

In 1996 Democrat Michael Coles was running against Republican Newt Gingrich for the 6th congressional district seat. Mr. Coles avoided President Clinton at rallies in Atlanta and Macon.... "I think the difficult thing for anyone in Georgia - if you run as a Democrat- is to separate yourself from not being a national Democrat, because Georgia Democrats like Zell Miller and Sam Nunn are cut out of a different cloth and that's how I wanted to be seen."

Republicans, on the other hand, are overjoyed to see him. I understand Sonny Perdue will be going out to meet his plane and welcome him down. The more people see of him, the better the Republican Party will do come November.

Grim is going to like this one.

When one thinks of heraldry, images of the lion and the unicorn most often spring to mind. In Papua New Guinea, however, beer labels are featured on shields used as protection in battle. Fighting shields had not been used in 50 years but when war broke out between groups in the 1980’s there was a need for them once more. Artist Kaipel Ka uses beer advertising designs on shields he makes for various warring groups. The emblems act like the team colors of sporting groups.

Heh. So, what would you put on yours?

Njal Week Four

Njal's Saga, Week Four:

Here is this week's reading, and here is next week's.

I should say something about "outlawry," because it comes up in this week's readings, and will be of great importance later in the saga as well. There was no death penalty in Icelandic law of the period. Indeed, until this week, we haven't seen anything like criminal law employed at all -- the lawsuits have been more like our civil suits, where people are awarded damages and compensation, but no one is physically punished by the state.

This is a delightful feature of medieval Icelandic law, which contrasts sharply with the law as practiced everywhere else (including in Viking societies with kings, such as Norway or Denmark). Nevertheless, there were occasions when the Icelandic courts could authorize force. This was done by declaring a man to be an "outlaw." The court does not physically punish the outlaw. It merely removes the protection of the law from him -- not usually forever, but for a period of time. During that period, if he is killed, the courts take no notice. Normally men went into exile during their period of outlawry, so as to avoid being killed; but some outlaws were dangerous enough that they felt no need to do so, and lived pleasantly in Iceland in spite of their status. The most famous of these is Grettir Ásmundarson, or "Grettir the Outlaw," about whom there is also a famous saga.

If this is a 'criminal penalty,' it comes up for reasons that may sometimes strike us as strange. Dozens have been killed so far without it ever being invoked; but we see what seems like a pretty minor offense threatened with outlawry this week.

"What!" says Geir, "wilt thou challenge me to the island as thou
art wont, and not bear the law?"

"Not that," says Gunnar; "I shall summon thee at the Hill of Laws
for that thou calledst those men on the inquest who had no right
to deal with Audulf's slaying, and I will declare thee for that
guilty of outlawry."

This is a procedural violation -- Geir has simply involved the wrong people in the inquest. That doesn't merely invalidate his complaint, but also makes him subject to the penalty of outlawry. Why?

The reason is that defying the rules of the court is being punished symmetrically: if you don't play by the rules of the law, you lose the protection of the law. In Anglo-Saxon law, where there was also a concept of outlawry that was somewhat similar, ignoring a summons to appear at court one of the common ways to be declared Caput gerat lupinum (lit. "one who bears a wolfish head," or 'a wolf's head' -- i.e., someone who could be killed like a wolf, with no penalty).

A second matter: there are two references to priests in this week's reading. Geir "the Priest" is one of the actors, and Gunnar promises to make an oath before a priest. Note that the 'priesthood' being referenced here is heathen! We will read about the Conversion of Iceland later in the saga.

The word being translated as "priest" is usually goði. There were often female Gyðja. Their legal and political function is more important than their religious function, and the office continued to exist for these purposes even after the conversion. Somewhat like notaries public, they held special powers to witness, etc., based on the respect due their office. Before the Conversion, they might -- but did not necessarily -- maintain privately-owned temples, called hoffs.

Zinn

Zinn the Communist:

This is not shocking to anyone who's read his books; in fact, it's the perfect explanation for them. The story combines frantic Communism (attended CPUSA meetings five nights a week) with blatant dishonesty (lied about it).

Zinn died not long ago, but he lived long enough to write a piece about the first year of the Obama presidency.

I thought that in the area of constitutional rights he would be better than he has been. That's the greatest disappointment, because Obama went to Harvard Law School and is presumably dedicated to constitutional rights. But he becomes president, and he's not making any significant step away from Bush policies. Sure, he keeps talking about closing Guantánamo, but he still treats the prisoners there as "suspected terrorists." They have not been tried and have not been found guilty. So when Obama proposes taking people out of Guantánamo and putting them into other prisons, he's not advancing the cause of constitutional rights very far. And then he's gone into court arguing for preventive detention, and he's continued the policy of sending suspects to countries where they very well may be tortured.

I think people are dazzled by Obama's rhetoric, and that people ought to begin to understand that Obama is going to be a mediocre president--which means, in our time, a dangerous president--unless there is some national movement to push him in a better direction.

There is, of course: the Tea Party Movement.

Preparing for the End

Preparing for the End:

The NYT is considering how you can offset the failure of Social Security. I find myself shaking my head in amazement as I read the piece.

AT 35 YEARS OLD At this stage, our couple are earning $120,000 ($60,000 each) and they have $75,000 in total retirement savings. But to make up for the decline in Social Security benefits, they need to save about $84,474 above and beyond what they are already saving before they retire. We assume they save the extra money in a taxable account that allows for easy access, because they are already saving 10 percent or more of their total income in a 401(k). That extra money saved is equivalent to about a 7.8 percent increase in total retirement savings, across all accounts. This also means they’ll have less discretionary income — about 9.4 percent less to be exact — to spend each year, over the course of their lives.

Wow, that's really going to be hard -- but with a bit of belt-tightening, everything will be just fine. Assuming, of course, that your household earns $120,000 a year from age 35. Only seventeen percent of households are in that range; and as peak earning years are later in life, mostly they won't be young couples.

Oh, they also need to have $75,000 in retirement savings already. That's about three and a half times as much as the average 35-year old. Assuming both of them have the average in savings, that gets you a little more than halfway to $75K.

How about some more reasonable estimates? Let's say they earn half what you're projecting, and have more average salaries. Now, to follow the NYT's easy math, they only need to find a way to almost double their combined savings this year, and then they need to save at a far greater rate (with half the money, and much less disposable income).

Assuming they can't do that, they need to expect they won't be retiring -- not at 67, and probably not ever. If they have jobs, they'd better keep them!

Music

Music of Honor:

It's been too long since we had a post devoted to music, which is at the core of our visions of beauty. Here is an old favorite of mine, in two parts.






The new comments system lets you post YouTube videos easily. Show me your favorites.

How good an officer would you have been?

I got a 72 despite arguing with superiors (imagine that).

Academic Review: Begging for a Fatwa Edition

Muslim Lesbians in the Middle Ages:

On the topic of people who stand up for what they believe, I have to express a certain admiration for the courage of the scholar who decided to write this paper:

Arab lesbians were both named and visible in medieval Arabic literature. Moreover, and in contrast to their status in the medieval West in the same period, for example, Arab lesbians were not considered guilty of a “silent sin,” and there is no clear evidence that their “crime” was punished by death. In fact, lesbianism in the medieval Islamicate literary world was a topic deemed worthy of discussion and a lifestyle worthy of emulation.

Amer also notes that Islamic legal texts have very little to say about same-sex relations and practices between women, and that perhaps it was considered an acceptable alternative for women in avoiding sex with other men outside of marriage. For example, a 14th century Arab writer, explains, "Know that lesbianism insures against social disgrace…"

That's going to be a highly unacceptable thesis to a whole lot of people. I hope the debate over it remains within traditional academic protocol, because there is some reason to believe that it might not.

Hooah, Sir

Hooah, Sir:

Now, that sounds like a man who cares about what he thinks is right. I might differ on the question of what he thinks is right, but I love a man who stands up and fights for it.