Seriously?

The Power of the Press (Secretary):

This report is stunning:

[D]uring President Obama's trip to India, Gibbs assumed the role of press advocate and threatened to pull Obama out of bilateral talks with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh because three U.S. reporters were blocked from covering the meeting.

It's nice that Gibbs has the interest of the American press at heart, but -- did I understand that the press secretary was going to pull the US President out of bilateral talks? Gibbs said he was "serious" about this threat.

Normally that would seem to be overstepping one's authority a little bit. The idea that a press secretary might have veto power over whether the President is allowed to attend negotiations with another head of government... that's alarming. I know they work closely together, but still! The President might value his advisor's opinion without the advisor having that kind of authority over him. Gibbs seems confident, though: he didn't say he would ask the President to pull out of the negotiations, but that he would pull him out.

The End of (a) Tyranny

The End of (a) Tyranny:

The West awakes:

The US, bizarrely, is running at least 10 years behind in this process, having elected a government which chose to embark on the social democratic experiment at precisely the moment when its Western European inventors were despairing of it, and desperately trying to find politically palatable ways of winding it down.

The American people – being made of rather different stuff and having historical roots which incline them to be distrustful of government in any form – immediately rejected the whole idea....

So a generation after the collapse of totalitarian socialism, its democratic form is finally crumbling as well. And, oddly enough, the latter may take longer than the former to unravel. The one virtue of totalitarian governments is that they can be swept away in a single blow, either through violent overthrow or – as in the case of Soviet communism – by their populations simply walking out from under them.

Here's to the end of the Soviet Union, and to the good people long under her who had the sense to walk away. They were the ones who carried the weight, and when they came to see things clearly, they are the ones who laid it down.



May we know such sense, in our own way.

Not Quite, Bill

Not Quite, Bill:

There's a serious error in the first few seconds of this video, which undermines the message quite a bit. He posits a situation in which a unanimous Congress passes a law overturning the First Amendment, signed by the President; and he says that the right thing to do would be to resist this 'procedurally correct, unanimous' law.

What he wants to get at is a discussion of positive law (or 'political law,' as he calls it) versus natural law.

Unfortunately, the example doesn't go with the discussion. All of you see the problem: a law of the sort he describes would be unconstitutional on its face. A simple act of legislation cannot amend the Constitution. A government that tried to set aside the Constitution through simple legislation would merit a revolt even within the limited terms of positive law. Many of us have an obligation by oath to uphold the Constitution in such circumstances.

In order to get at the point he wants to get at, we need to think about whether or not it would be legitimate to amend the Constitution in a way that eliminates the First Amendment freedoms. The President doesn't sign proposed constitutional amendments; they go to the states for ratification.

The real point only becomes clear if and only if three-quarters or more of the states ratify the law -- the amendment that overturns the First Amendment. Now, perhaps, it's a question of natural law justifying a revolt against an unjust positive law.

Boom

A Boom in Crocodiles:

Apparently the makers of Cassidy's ad received certain complains.



I thought that was a most civilized reply.

Super-Rabbit

Super-Rabbit:

The ultimate lines of this episode are relevant.

Bugs Bunny-Super rabbit



I assume you know why.

Celebration Ale

Celebration Ale:

My favorite drink appeared today. It's available for about two months of the year, from sometime in November until the end of Yuletide.

Fine stuff. It reminds me of a joke, though. I was shopping for a birthday card, and I came across one that said something like:

"Happy birthday! I consulted a prominent astrologer to learn about your stars, and now I know which sign has the greatest influence on your life."

You open up the card, and a sign folds out that reads: "BAR."

Well, it's Friday. Be merry.

Demotivators

Project VALOUR-IT: Demotivators

I was asked to link to Cassandra's Demotivator's post, as a part of the VALOUR-IT challenge. Asked, and by a lady of noble spirit, I obey.

I would have done it sooner, but I wanted to think of a good demotivator. The truth is, while I had some good ones last year, I can't think of anything this year.

Apologies

Apologies:

One of you wrote today to ask me after something I once wrote on how a gentleman ought to apologize. I can't remember where it was, and I haven't found it; but it takes only a moment to spell out the rules. The rules are simple. A gentleman is a fighting man, and is therefore meant to be frank.

1) Take responsibility for the fault.
2) Explicitly say either "I am sorry" or "I apologize."
3) In a few words, explain yourself without attempting to excuse yourself.

I realize that can be very hard. I didn't say it was easy, though; I said it was simple. There is a sense in which God is simple. That doesn't make it easy to understand his nature; in fact, it makes it much harder.

That's what Carl Von Clausewitz said, though: 'In war, everything is simple; and the simplest things are hard.'

Speaking of what is hard, a harder thing to do than to give a good apology is to receive one. I hold with Alexander Dumas, who wrote -- I can't seem to find the precise quote of his either -- that a gentleman can do no more than apologize. Once that has been done, his honor is neatly concerned with having his apology received on honorable terms. If that is also done, he can do very much more: but if it is not done, he cannot.

It is therefore of chief importance that we learn to accept an honest and sincere apology. We are enjoined to forgive everything, and love our enemies as well as our neighbors. That is another simple rule that proves very hard.

Yet there it is.

"A penny for the old Guy, sir."

"A penny for the old Guy, sir."

If no one else is going to get to it, I guess it's up to me to remind us of today's date.

Remember, remember, the Fifth of November
'Twas Gunpowder Treason and plot.
I see no reason why Gunpowder Treason
Should ever be forgot.

I'm giving you early warning so you can get your bonfires going for tonight, and prepare your bangers and mash, bonfire toffee, parkin, and baked potatoes.

For those of you without strong feelings concerning a plot to murder James I and restore the True Faith to Protestant England, this is just Samhain, the Celtic fire/harvest festival that marks the end of summer, when the veil between the Overworld and the Underworld stretches thin, and candles can be left in an open western window to welcome visits from the beloved dead. It's time to decide which livestock must be slaughtered in order for both the herds and the people to survive the winter. The children should also prepare for guising and pranks -- or we may be a few days late for that.

Air America

For Bill:

I don't know if Hulu works in Iraq -- I never had time to try to use it -- but if it does, you might enjoy this little comedy.

Poetry Time

Poetry:

Nicholas Kristof writes, "Mr. Obama, it's time for some poetry."

I like poetry. I'm especially fond of this:

And the eyes of Guthrum altered,
For the first time since morn....

As such a tall and tilted sky
Sends certain snow or light,
So did the eyes of Guthrum change,
And the turn was more certain and more strange
Than a thousand men in flight.

For not till the floor of the skies is split,
And hell-fire shines through the sea,
Or the stars look up through the rent earth's knees,
Cometh such rending of certainties,
As when one wise man truly sees
What is more wise than he....

King Guthrum was a great lord,
And higher than his gods--
He put the popes to laughter,
He chid the saints with rods,

He took this hollow world of ours
For a cup to hold his wine;
In the parting of the woodways
There came to him a sign....

Far out to the winding river
The blood ran down for days,
When we put the cross on Guthrum
In the parting of the ways.

More Tea Party commentary

Have some more.

Chronicle of Philanthropy article on Tea Parties

I am quite pleased someone in philanthropy is seeing the civic engagement value of the Tea Parties!

The rise of the Tea Party movement, in short, suggests that fears of civic disengagement in the United States may have been exaggerated. When motivated by a compelling set of issues, it seems that Americans can still put together an impressive campaign, spontaneously, swiftly, and with little professional leadership or guidance. Whatever their inclination toward “bowling alone,” they are capable of working together when necessary. For that reason alone, the philanthropic world should find at least some comfort in the Tea Party’s accomplishments.

Read and enjoy!

Hey, Let's Bail Out Some Broke States!

Hey, Let's Bail Out Some Broke States!

I know I said yesterday the new House would be chilly to proposals for a California bailout, but my husband points out we're already on the hook for some of that. The Spendulus Bill that contributed so heavily to the wave of voter revulsion on Tuesday left us with a little gift that's still giving: the "Build America Bonds Program." ("Build" is being used here in its technical progressive sense of "throwing tax revenues at cronies who demonstrate some tenuous connection to economic activity as long as it involves unions.") The bonds are not tax-exempt, like most munis. The Obama administration is said to disfavor tax-exempt munis, which mostly benefit high-bracket investors for whom tax deductions are more valuable. But as unpopular as tax-exempt munis may be with the current administration's financial team, they felt compelled to address the credit-crunch-induced 17% drop in muni sales between 2007 and 2008. They chose to address it with a program that directly subsidized the interest burden on taxable debt issued for capital projects:

Since its introduction last year, the Build America program has come to account for about 26 percent of the muni-bond market, and October was its biggest month yet.

One reason: Issuers were scrambling to take advantage of the program's benefits — which include the federal government footing the bill for 35 percent of the bonds' interest costs. Of course, demand for the bonds, now a significant cornerstone of the $2.8 trillion muni market, has also been strong.

The program expires at the end of 2010. Will the lame-duck Congress extend it? Worse, will the new House extend it? In the meantime, program participants are issuing federally guaranteed bonds like crazy in the time they have left. But they're finding that the spreads are growing. Does this reflect an increasing unease over whether the issuers will be expected to foot the bill for their own interest obligations in the near future, or just a recognition that the market is about to be flooded with issuances by users trying to get in under the wire? Bloomberg reports:

Build America Bonds, the fastest- growing part of the $2.8 trillion municipal debt market, are poised for the biggest monthly loss in 2010 as an increased supply of the taxable debt drives up yields.

States and municipalities have sold about $4.9 billion of the federally subsidized securities this week, the most since the five-day trading period ended April 24, 2009, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Issuers have placed 49 offerings for sale, the highest number since the program’s creation by the economic stimulus package in February 2009, Bloomberg data show.

President Obama announced on Monday of this week a proposal to expand the Build America Bonds program to include refinancing some existing debt and covering "short-term governmental operating costs." In other news, the Fed is going ahead with a $600 billion purchase of treasuries in order to prop those prices up, too. What could go wrong? When we finish bailing out the states and everyone else we can think of, someone surely will bail out the U.S. I'm sure they'll be nice enough not to impose any onerous conditions.

Elections

Elections 2010:

This is the fourth time I have written about national election results on this blog; first in 2004, then 2006, and last in 2008. The elections have swung wildly: 2000, 2002 and 2004 were the swing toward Republicans, and then 2006-8 were the swing away from the Republicans. Now there is a swing back, historic in size but still insufficient to yield control of more than one house of Congress.

The lesson in each of these elections has been that the Federal government is too powerful relative to the states and the citizenry. It matters too much who wins. It shouldn't be so big a deal; it wouldn't be, if we could re-balance the load along constitutional lines.

It's not just the elected branches suffering from this strain: we can't fill Federal judgeships because the power invested in Federal courts has become so great. There's no room left for trust, whether it's for liberal senators considering a conservative judge or conservative senators considering a liberal one. The courts have taken on so much power that they are breaking under the weight of it.

I don't find that these recent results make me feel any better about the direction of the country. They have staunched the bleeding in some respects, but there remains a lot of harm that can be done by bad policy; and no way to address the structural problems, because the divided government won't be able to make the changes we need.

The Federal government by necessity imposes one-size fits all solutions on the people of the United States. The lesson of these wild swings is partially that there are strong minorities with deep opposition in their world views. We will continue to experience distrust as long as we have to believe that our way of life is threatened by the other side of the aisle. We have little choice but to believe that as long as the Federal government claims the power to ignore or revise the Constitution on the fly, and as long as it continues to ignore the hard limits imposed by the Constitution, especially the 10th Amendment.

Both liberals and conservatives would feel far more secure and at ease in their nation if we stopped using the Federal government to force major changes on the whole Republic. Forcing issues like abortion and the nature of marriage with Federal power is causing us to tear apart at the seams.

This is to say nothing of the power it has claimed to promise our children's generation enormous debts, in order to spend today; just as it placed those now entering their age a future of poverty when it spent the so-called "trust fund," and failed to lay aside adequately to fund its pensions.

This is a weapon that needs to be unmade. The only way to restore peace and stability to the Republic is to make the Federal government surrender much of its power to the states and to the People, and to obey and abide by the Constitution according to the intent of the framers, or the original intent of the amendments.

We must also address the spending habits of the government. Only this last item shows any real hope for improvement from this week's elections. As I said, it's a way of staunching some of the bleeding; but it doesn't close the wound, and it doesn't mean we've healed.

The View from the States

The View from the States

From the point of view of the states, it's not just the governor's mansions that changed hands yesterday. Because over 500 state legislative seats turned from blue to red, Republicans now hold the majority in both chambers of 26 state legislatures. Nor did Democrats fare well in state and local school board elections.

All this points to massive changes in states' approaches to their widespread budget crises, especially those stemming from defined-benefit pension obligations. As J.P. Friere points out, lately New Jersey Governor Chris Christie has been getting all the publicity as he battles entrenched teachers' unions. Now, all public sector unions in at least half the states in the country can expect a headwind. And don't forget the vouchers, guys.

Rebuke

Rebuke

RealClearPolitics gives the Republican pickups as a minimum of net +6 U.S. Senators, +61 U.S Representatives, and +7 state governors. The senate races in Colorado and Washington remain too close to call, so there is still considerable hope for Buck and Rossi. The net Republican pickups in the governor's races included Michigan, Wisconsin, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Kansas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Wyoming, offset by Democratic pickups in California and Hawaii. Rhode Island now has an Independent governor.

The New York Times is calling it +60 House seats (11 undecided), and provides a good graphic of gains and changes from 2002 through 2010.

Gone: Senate Agriculture Committee Chair Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), House Budget Committee Chair John Spratt (D-S.C.), House Armed Services Committee Chair Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), and 10-term Rep. Chet Edwards (D-Tex.). Pelosi (D-Ca.) still holds her seat but no longer will be Speaker of the House. Tea Party/Conservative GOP wins included new Senators Rand Paul of Kentucky, Marco Rubio of Florida, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, and Mike Lee of Utah. Tea Party Senate losers: Christine O'Donnell (Del.), Sharron Angle (Nev.), and (probably) Larry Miller (Alaska). Democrats Brown and Boxer won the governor's and U.S. Senate races in California, respectively, but the Moonbeam State will find it tough to cadge a bailout out of the new U.S. House. Reid (D.-Nev.) remains Senate Majority Leader but is beginning to make noises about how ObamaCare may need "tweaking." A small part of my disappointment over Reid's retention of his seat is offset by new Senator Kirk (R.-Ill.), who took President Obama's old seat.

The Senate party turncoat roundup: In the plus column, Arlen ("Dead to Me") Specter's ghost is put to rest as his post-apostacy Democratic primary challenger Sestak loses to new Senator Toomey (R-Pa.), a conservative who's been getting cold-shouldered by the Republican leadership for years. Similarly, Charlie ("Dead to Me") Crist, after playing footsie with the Democratic party, was annihilated by new Senator Rubio (R-Fla.) despite Crist's hope of overturning the results of the Republican primary in which his party faithful suggested he take a hike. On the other hand, Lisa ("Dead to Me") Murkowski seems to have an excellent shot at overturning the results of the Republican primary in Alaska by winning a disappointing write-in victory over Tea Party challenger Joe Miller. Murkowski denies recent rumors that she would consider caucusing with Democrats if she retains her Senate seat.

The Pew Research Center reported that the percentage of voters identifying themselves as conservatives increased from 32 to 34 to 41 percent from 2006 to this year. The portion of voters supporting the Tea Party reached 40%. Women split 50-50 between Republicans and Democrats. Independents backed Republicans by 55% to 40%. Republicans made gains among voters earning between $50,000 and $100,000 a year as well as among seniors.

Reckoning

I don't think I've ever agreed with a column more.

What do you think?

Dawn:

Don't ya'll need to be getting to the polls?

Dainty

"Dainty"

Via Cassy Fiano, whose blog I've been reading on account of her participation in the Marine Team, Project VALOUR-IT(!), an examination of the question of whether chivalry is necessarily sexist. The philosophical inquiry into the question begins at the 1:50 mark.



The answer given to what about chivalry is sexist is this: "The notion of gender difference whereby women are these sort of... you know, the dainty, delicate, in need of assistance... sort of the 'women and children first' on the liferaft."

Some people are certainly guilty of making such assumptions about women; but chivalry is not guilty of them. For example, consider the following plate from the work of Hans Talhoffer, a fifteenth-century master of arms. It is telling for two reasons:

1) It treats a judicial duel. In an era when every legal question could be resolved by such a duel, women might well find themselves wanting to fight one. The assumption of modern readers is that they were therefore placed in a position of 'needing assistance' -- as from a champion, perhaps. Not so! The medievals simply balanced the playing field, by constructing rules that made for a fair fight. The man is required to fight with a wooden club (limiting his force and the effectiveness of any martial training), while standing in a pit two feet deep. The woman swings a stone in her veil, of about five pounds -- around the weight of a small sledgehammer.

That a master of arms like Talhoffer -- who made his living teaching fighting skills -- went to the trouble of drawing up such plates indicates that this was common enough that prospective clients were worried about it.

2) The plate here is described as follows: "The woman has grasped the man's head from behind to pull him out of the pit onto his back, and strangle him." In other words, no one thought she would be dainty.



This series of plates, by the way, ends with a plate described as follows: "The woman has the man locked in a hold by the neck and the groin, and pulls him out of the pit." If you want to see the plate (and many others nearly as interesting), it's available in Medieval Combat by Hans Talhoffer, trans. & ed. by Mark Rector.

We've talked about all this before, of course, but it's important to separate 19th-century ideas from the original fighting ideas. Chivalry as an term didn't treat of women originally; it was at first just a name for a band of horsemen. Eventually it became an ethic, one based on feudal loyalty. The language of courtly love is the language of feudal oaths, with service and loyalty being a mutual bond: one between lady and knight, as between lord and knight. It was an ethic of mutual service and love, whereby I helped you and cared for you, and you aided me in return. The lady was often of greater power and status; there was much she could do for a young knight, in return for his friendship and service. This was as true for the feudal bond between lord and knight, as for the courtly bond between lady and knight.

If chivalry is "sexist," it is so in the sense of recognizing a difference between the sexes with the intent of honoring it. It is no insult; practiced properly, it entertains no insults. It is only an offer of service and friendship, in the hope that such service and such friendship will meet with a fit reply.

In the frank offer, at least, it is the language of equals. To the degree that this is an illusion, it is an illusion because the knight is the weaker party. In making an offer in the language of equals, he is the one who is making bold.