A Disappointing Day

Today I've learned that my hopes to someday be appointed to the Supreme Court are never going to pan out. Apparently drinking in college, getting in bar fights, and similar things can be held against you in that regard. Fortunately, thanks to former President Obama, we know that cocaine and marijuana use cannot be held against you in your quest to become President; but unfortunately for me, I've never used cocaine or marijuana. I might have had some beer, though; and I can't promise under oath that there have never been any bar fights. Friendly ones, more or less. Just good fun. All the same, there might have been some.

Apparently this sort of thing is disqualifying. The latest story I've heard is that someone is alleging that K's frat may have hired a stripper to perform a "public sex act" at the frathouse, albeit after he had graduated and gone on to law school. I'd heretofore understood the Democratic Party's position on 'sex workers' to be that they should be treated with respect, which surely should mean that giving them some employment shouldn't be beyond the pale. I certainly don't wish to suggest that people who engage in such work are necessarily immoral or wicked, nor those who employ them; all the same, I've never been interested. However, I did once attend a birthday party where a stripper performed. I was 15 or 16, and so embarrassed that I fled immediately. But the folks who employed her were Volunteer firefighters, friends of my father's and pillars of the community insofar as they'd report anywhere in the middle of the night to deal with fire or accident. They just liked to see a pretty girl once in a while. They had no intention of assaulting her, and she was performing there of her own free will.

Catholic theologians can explain just why this is nevertheless sinful, although at the moment the Church might better avail itself of expunging the beam in its own eye than in explication in the mote in others'. In fact one might argue that the Church might have better employed strippers occasionally, as by all accounts it used to do, than to have handed itself over to those who didn't care to see a pretty girl once in a while. Lusting after the pretty girl who voluntarily performs for you can be handled in Confession; the assault on the children is unlikely to be as readily satisfied, even according to the most careful theology of the Church.

The Democratic Party is not covering itself in democracy here. Opposing sex and beer and rowdy fire may be moral according to some visions, but not according to the democratic vision.

All the same, I've learned this week that I'll never be a judge. Too bad for you: I'm a pretty lenient one. You'll be sad to be judged by those who never had a fault themselves, if such people can in fact be found. As Chesterton warned: "Oh drunkards in my cellar, boys in my apple tree: the world grows stiff and strange and new, and wise men shall rule over you; and you shall weep for me."

My.... "Kampf"

Apparently grievance scholarship is subject to some... many... weaknesses.

Affilia, a peer-reviewed journal of women and social work, formally accepted the trio’s hoax paper, “Our Struggle Is My Struggle: Solidarity Feminism as an Intersectional Reply to Neoliberal and Choice Feminism.” The second portion of the paper is a rewrite of a chapter from “Mein Kampf.” Affilia’s editors declined to comment.

Now, in fairness, no one reads "Mein Kampf." You wouldn't be expected to recognize a rewrite the way you would a rewrite of the Declaration of Independence or something similar. On the other hand, unless Hitler was a writer of greater intellectual quality than I've been led to believe, you'd think a mere rewrite of his work would draw something less than academic approval.

But that's not all. Oh, no. This crew has been up to quite a bit of mischief, which you can read about at the link.

Battlefield Rations: The Food Given to the British Soldier for Marching and Fighting 1900-2011

Just read Mark Barnes's review of the book Battlefield Rations: The Food Given to the British Soldier for Marching and Fighting 1900-2011 by Anthony Clayton. It looks like an interesting read, and I enjoyed the review.

Many years ago I had the opportunity to try out some of the British Army's field cuisine. I remember the packet held two meals and included a one-mug sized stove for heating your tea. That's really about all I remember of it, now.

A Wrinkle in the Memory Discussion

As readers know, I've been entertaining the hypothesis of false memory since the revelation that Dr. Ford's memories first were attested long after the alleged fact in a psychotherapy session. While not proven, the hypothesis' probability of being true was considerably strengthened in my view when literally all of the people she remembered as present denied that the event had ever happened -- including a life long female friend. The basic form of the memory, a life-altering trauma occurring early in life but first attested years later in therapy, fits a well-known phenomenon.

Now the Federalist has uncovered a study that Dr. Ford participated in, indeed co-authored, on the use of hypnosis to 'retrieve' memories as well as to "create artificial situations that would permit the client to express ego-dystonic emotions in a safe manner." While Dr. Ford is a statistician, and thus was professionally most likely involved in the quantitative work, we know now that she was familiar with these techniques. It would be fair to ask whether or not she has used them in this matter.

UPDATE: The Federalist is now also publishing a piece based allegedly on a sworn statement from an old boyfriend that claims Ford perjured herself in her testimony about lie detector tests. I'm not sure if this means that the Federalist is running hit pieces on her, which would demean the quality of the previous citation; or if it means that Ford is going to prove to be generally unreliable.

Another Embracer

The first President to brew beer on the White House grounds was... Barack Obama. It's just what you do, explains a former White House aide for nutrition, if you're 'a regular guy and you're a good guy.'

I read that President Obama’s administration was the first that had brewing in the White House. Could you tell me a little bit about that?

That’s my understanding. You know, obviously, there could be some beer that we don’t know about, but the person who ran the archives for the White House did research and looked through all the records and sort of found no evidence of any beer being brewed, or liquor distilled, on the grounds of the White House.

Washington was distilling various spirits in Mount Vernon and Thomas Jefferson was making wine in Monticello, but at the White House proper, we don’t know of any evidence that there was a president who brewed beer....

Beer had a prominent role in this White House administration. There was the beer summit, and Obama was often photographed drinking beer in his travels. Can you help us understand that?

I think there’s something powerful about beer. It’s food more broadly, but I think beer really captures the spirit of coming together, of sitting down, of sharing human moments, friendship moments, bonding moments. I mean, we all do it all the time. What’s better than sitting down with some friends or even sitting down with somebody to work something out and saying, “OK. Let me buy a beer. Let’s talk this over”? And I think it holds a really sacred part of our culture.

Showing the country that we’re part of this ongoing narrative and dialogue that’s been going on for centuries––well, it’s quite powerful. It’s also just naturally what you do if you’re a regular guy and you’re a good guy, and that’s really what the president is.

I don't disagree. It's a pretty normal thing for regular, good guys to like.

Counterattack

Lindsey Graham has decided to press for an investigation of Sen. Fenstein's conduct.

Done, done, done, done, and done.

Apropos of our earlier discussion in the comments about taking concrete action rather than writhing in impotent disgust, here are five links to Republican Senate race campaigns where your donation might do the most good:

Missouri
North Dakota
Indiana
West Virginia
Montana

And in the meantime, everyone will be pleased to hear that the polls just flipped on Sen. Claire McCaskill in her Missouri race, on the heels of her announced intention to vote against Judge Kavanaugh.

Burn it down.  Plough it under.  Salt the ground it stood on.

The wind that would blow

Mountain Heritage Day

Today was the 44th Mountain Heritage Day at Western Carolina University. There were wagon trains led by Belgians or mules, tractors, three music stages featuring traditional music, and a full scale arts and crafts festival. Some of the latter included custom iron and knives, but also beading and woodworking. If you're ever in that part of the world for a future one, consider stopping by.

One of the events was shape note singing.

Bluegrass was a favorite.

Clogging, which was performed as well as other forms of traditional mountain dancing.

It was a welcome escape. Crazy is on the internet; ride out into America, and it's still sane and nice.

Something else that might work.

Or maybe not.  Ian Millhiser is just spitballing here:

Tell me again why we shouldn't confront Republicans where they eat, where they sleep, and where they work until they stop being complicit in the destruction of our democracy.

I'll bet all of you can come up with the answer that eludes him.

That might work

From Powerline's "The Week in Pictures":  "Trump should nominate Hillary Clinton to the Supreme Court, so he can finally get an investigation of her started."

I Embrace Beer

This is actually not the Clancy Brothers, in spite of the video, but the Dubliners. But let all that go; drink up, mates. May the wicked like us find forgiveness, and the wicked like them find justice. Or even better: God forgive us all, though none of us deserves it.

UPDATE:

An Aussie tune.



UPDATE:

I particularly like this song because every single claim it makes is wrong. Beer long predates tea; it's not made of hops, which are a late addition for flavor; and the rest of it too is nonsense.

But it's fun.

Let's Be Sure To Baby Those Women

"How to talk to the women in your life right now."

Let me tell you: it's a lot. And it makes functioning on a baseline level difficult. You may have noticed that the women in your life have been particularly unhappy over the past two weeks as this news cycle reared its ugly head: we have been showing up late to work, giving you surly looks, loudly complaining about "men", et cetera. These are coping mechanisms. And perhaps you, a thoughtful and potentially kind-hearted person, want to know how to better support your non-male friends and colleagues. This is a very good instinct! We appreciate it. Here is some advice on how to do that...

Showing up late for work is of course perfectly excusable if you're... upset? Right. Because you're not a real professional. You're a woman. We should be glad you deigned to come in to work at all, given how difficult all this is for you.

My guess is that teaching people that they're rightly treated as frail, or fragile, makes them worse people. Teach them they need to deal with the stuff life throws at them, and that they shouldn't expect it to be fair. That's how you build resilient people. People who don't show up late for work just because they're angry about something else.

Professionals. Killers. The kind of people who make the world heel to them, rather than running late to appointments. Five minutes early is on time; on time is late; late is unacceptable because it's disrespectful.

A new civil rights crisis

I can't be sure, but I think this author is serious:

The profile of an early voter tends to be more partisan, older and well educated. Early voters are also motivated and organized, which stands to reason since there are many steps involved, particularly with absentee voting; one must obtain the ballot in advance, fill it out correctly and mail it back on time.

These tend not to be the strongest traits of millennial voters. Fairfax County, Va., government recently surveyed the voting behavior of its summer interns, and discovered that a major obstacle to mailing in ballots was not knowing how to get a postage stamp. (For some millennials, mailing anything is a new experience.)

In addition, “college students are busy and the slightest hurdle can prevent them from mailing back a ballot,” said Lisa Connors, a public affairs officer with Fairfax County. She added, “Having a book of stamps or mailing anything is an old-fashioned concept.”

In many states, ballots now include return postage, so the completed ballot is automatically sent to election officials, who will reimburse the Postal Service for the expense. But this assumes millennials know about mailboxes.

Better Dead Than Red

Communists plot violence in the USA. Not even in hiding -- on Twitter.

A Start, Perhaps

The Pope defrocks a priest at the center of scandals.

Pope Francis has defrocked a Chilean priest who was a central character in the global sex abuse scandal rocking his papacy, invoking his “supreme” authority to stiffen an earlier sentence because of the “exceptional amount of damage” the priest’s crimes had caused.

In a statement Friday, the Vatican said Francis had laicized 88-year-old Rev. Fernando Karadima, who was originally sanctioned in 2011 to live a lifetime of “penance and prayer” for having sexually abused minors in the upscale Santiago parish he ran.

The Vatican said Francis was doing so for “the good of the church.”

“It is without doubt an exceptional measure, but Karadima’s grave crimes have caused exceptional damage in Chile,” Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said.

The “penance and prayer” sanction has been the Vatican’s punishment of choice for elderly priests convicted of raping and molesting children. It has long been criticized by victims as too soft and essentially an all-expenses-paid retirement, and Karadima’s whistleblowers had pressed for it to be toughened.

This Is Perfectly Healthy

"They complain that even when they give them gender-neutral toys, the boys immediately rush for the trucks."

As you would expect, the radio interview is totally in favor of feminism, but can't help but admit that the relationship has been poisoned. "Some feminists envision a world without men." "I was forced to conclude that feminism had failed mothers and sons." It ends up endorsing a kind of cross-dressing dance therapy, because of course life itself is so traumatic that therapy is necessary for everything and dance therapy is obviously the right way to bring up your son. (Also cross-dressing, clearly. You think I'm joking about the content of the interview, but I'm not at all joking. This is their idea for fixing things.)

The Most Unexpected Hero

Lindsey Graham, lion of the Senate.



I have to admit that this is not the one I would have expected to shine brightest today or any day. But here we are. Well done, Senator.

"Violence"

Who is more likely to be victimized by teen dating violence? If you’re quick to think it’s girls, new data shows you’re wrong. In a surprising twist, recently published research indicates boys are more likely to report being victims of dating violence committed by partners who hit, slap or push them.

Researchers with the University of British Columbia (UBC) and Simon Fraser University (SFU) conducted a longitudinal study of dating violence. While reports of physical abuse went down over time, they say there is a troubling gender-related trend.

Five percent of teens reported physical abuse from their dating partners in 2013, down from 6 percent in 2003. But in the last year, 5.8 percent of boys reported dating violence compared to 4.2 percent of girls.

“It could be that it’s still socially acceptable for girls to hit or slap boys in dating relationships,” says lead author Catherine Shaffer, a PhD student with SFU, in a release. “This has been found in studies of adolescents in other countries as well.”

I'm surprised it's that small a difference (and encouraged that the figures make it close to 95% of relationships that do without such violence). My sense is that girls are indeed taught that it's socially acceptable to slap boys, and women often continue to believe that it's appropriate to slap men for certain things even in adulthood. Perhaps they just don't usually choose to date the boys they have to slap.

In any case, most of this "violence" is pretty mild, and a lot of it is defensive (and therefore really appropriate, not just 'felt to be appropriate'). The inability to distinguish between legitimate violence and illegitimate violence is a problem with our current society. Much violence is socially beneficial, or we wouldn't maintain police forces nor prisons nor armies.

The NRA Speaks