That was my tip-off, actually. I have heard that joke before, and from very proud Jews; it's not really self-deprecation, either, because they're honestly and legitimately proud of their cultural disposition towards fractious, vigorous intellectual debate. As I've said about religion and jokes before, religious jokes are great as long as they're offered in the right spirit. That spirit is the one that jokes from a place of love for the thing being joked about.
Anti-Semites Abound!
I won twenty dollars today off a professor I know who took this piece, published at Volokh, to be anti-Semitic. I wagered it would prove to be self-deprecating humor by another Jew; the author proves to be a board member of the Jewish Center for Religious Liberty. He's apparently drawn fire from progressive faculty before, who have trouble telling the difference between jokes like "Two Jews, three opinions" and actual anti-Semitism.
The union that isn't
This is what can happen when a group of people realize that their ostensible allies can't wait to put a knife in their backs.
The National ICE Council says its members are sick of being labeled Nazis and racists by fellow unionists and is filing charges with the Labor Department to seek financial autonomy from its parent unions, the AFL-CIO and the American Federation of Government Employees.
The council says it cannot get adequate representation from the two organizations, which “foster hate and prejudice” against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and have backed political candidates who call for defunding ICE — essentially advocating for the erasure of the 7,600 jobs the council represents. The council accuses the two labor groups of holding ICE employees captive. It says the parent unions, wanting to garner “partisan political favor” from the administration, refuse to let the employees manage their own affairs but won’t advocate for them.
“AFGE and the AFL-CIO became far-left organizations a long time ago,” Chris Crane, the council’s president, told The Washington Times. “They don’t care about workers. They only care about their far-left agendas and politics. The corruption and misspending in the organization is out of control. ICE employees want no part in it.”
The Fed Has Surprises Coming
J. P. Morgan's discussion of forthcoming Fed policies leads with Ezekiel 25:17.
The NYT's daily morning reader was all about this subject as well. Inflation must come down; that means demand must be destroyed. That means higher interest rates, which will increase unemployment, which will destroy demand. It's going to suck, especially for you people who don't work for a central bank.
Solstice
The Summer Solstice came at 5:14 AM today, beneath an alignment of all the visible planets. I happened to be awake for that, and it is quite a show. The planetary conjuction continues until the 27th.
Flavors of crooks
We watched 1981's "Absence of Malice" last night and were struck by what an innocent time it was. The plot turns on a strategic leak of a federal investigation, along with warrantless wiretaps, all intended to pressure someone who wasn't a real suspect into finking on some of his mobbed-up family members. There is a well-known climactic scene in which Wilford Brimley, an Asst. AG, shows up and shuts down the freak show with some scathing rebukes and pink slips for federal underlings who break the law. ("You're no presidential appointment. You work for me.") It's a very old-fashioned "the grownups are still in charge" moment.
The plot doesn't call for anyone even to be aware of anyone else's party affiliation, though the chief crooked fed does make a point of resenting the crime family's role in the suppression of unions. The journalists are treated with kid gloves, exquisitely aware of the inevitability of causing collateral damage with their courageous crusade to publish the truth, but also bravely willing to face their own moral failings in striking this balance.
A more prescient scene was the climax of 1975's "Three Days of the Condor," after Robert Redford has risked his life getting the incriminating files to the New York Times, and creepy spook Cliff Robertson asks him, "What if they won't publish it?"
These screenwriters wouldn't have known what to make of Rathergate, not to mention Russiagate, NYT vs. Project Veritas, or the recent poo-flinging at Wapo.
Since it’s Juneteenth
UPDATE: The Orthosphere on the traditions of a holiday that is new to many outside Texas. I recall it being celebrated in Atlanta thirty years ago, but then went more than two decades without hearing it mentioned after I moved out of that city.
An “anvil” was a volley of gunfire. I have found no discussion of the word, but the usage was clearly Southern and my guess is that “anvil” was a corruption of the word enfilade.
That sounds plausible, and is a nice preservation of the linkage between the rifle and individual democratic liberty.
Happy Father's Day
A number of you, like myself, are fathers. If you're like me, you forgot this day existed until you woke up this morning and saw somebody post it on Facebook. Fatherhood is not much celebrated in America today; indeed parenthood is not greatly appreciated by our cultural guardians, and fatherhood is both unacceptably masculine and indicative of some sort of biological binary that one might not be perfectly capable of transcending in the name of 'gender identity.' I suppose we shall hear even less about it in the future.
Still, fatherhood is a proud service that when done well provides lasting benefits to those who receive its service. It can also nurture important virtues in the man himself. As such it is worthy, quite apart from also being necessary to the survival of humanity and any sort of civilization.
Well done, ye who have done well.
Good reflexes
This could have ended worse.
Hatchet Guy had recently been released from jail in the Chicago area.
Cyberpunk 2022
A hit video game at the present moment is Cyberpunk 2077, which is tightly based on an old role playing game from the 1980s called Cyberpunk 2020. (Tightly enough that the original rulebook's sample adventure is actually portrayed in the game.) The game was based on fiction by William Gibson and Bruce Sterling, later filled out by others like Walter John Williams.
How close are we to that world? There are occasional stories about people figuring out how to integrate computers with human neural networks; last week there was a story about the Japanese figuring out how to make living, self-healing skin. Political theorists worry about it. You might find a lot of comparison between the original sources' concerns about corporate power (and continuing trouble from Russia, especially where hacking and aggression are concerned) and the real world we inhabit.
Amusingly, though, when they set out to build 'dark future' gas prices for the 2077 game they did so during the Trump administration. As a result, fuel prices in the game are lower than they are today.
It's not quite gasoline, though; the fuel is CHOOH2, an alcohol fuel similar to the ethanol the Biden administration has decided to choke us with. It'll destroy your engines if the engine wasn't specifically designed for it, as most engines aren't at even the 15% Biden is mandating -- let alone a pure alcohol fuel. It's especially destructive to small engines, motorcycles, and watercraft.
Commitment > Balance
According to the NYT report, the Administration is weighing the trade-off between modest actions that would be legally defensible, and bold, symbolic actions with questionable legal authority.
I'd wager they're all in for symbolic actions with questionable legal authority.
A Round for Freedom
Always remember that the two enemies are the Communists and the Woman’s Christian Temperance Union.
While the war raged in Korea, the war at home between beer lovers and anti-alcohol groups like the Woman's Christian Temperance Union was fought to keep beer out of the hands of the GIs. Then, a couple of brewing heavyweights escalated the conflict.Milwaukee's own Jos. Schlitz Brewing Company and Blatz Brewing Company offered to buy the troops a round and see what might happen.
One of my favorite movies, on this very subject and from not too long after this era, is Hallelujah Trail.
Science as a detective mystery
I've just finished a spectacularly dull county commissioners conference in Corpus Christi, something's that's required for continuing education hours. The only bright spot was the daily commute, about an hour each way, during which I turned to an audiobook I ordered more than six months ago. I'd started it, I think, and got bogged down in the first chapter or so. When I picked it back up this week it really took off. The book is "The Writing of the Gods," by Edward Dolnick, about the race to decode the Rosetta Stone. What a romp! And what a pleasure to read a well-put-together scientific discovery thriller written by an imaginative author with a graceful style, along with a gift for narrative and for developing broad techological themes.
I can't remember how I stumbled on this book last year, whether I was browsing on Audible or responding to a hint here or perhaps at Maggie's Farm.
When I was a kid my father did me the great favor of recommending Oscar Ogg's "The 26 Letters" and the World Books Encyclopedia entry on the alphabet. I never knew him to be interested in cryptology per se, though he loved puzzles. He did have a strong interest in the history of languages and often talked about the trends in sounds such as those identified by the collector of Grimm's Fairy Tales. He was also, even in adulthood, as fascinated as any young boy by the language and culture of ancient Egypt. We spent an enjoyable month once building a model pyramid for one of my school projects, complete with hieroglyphics on the tomb wall.
I've now ordered two more Dolnick audiobooks, one about the theft and recovery of "The Scream" (the Munch painting) and the other about Isaac Newton.
Swiftwater Technician
Usually it takes weeks to get exam results, but I guess they got excited. I am informed that all of us who survived to take the final have passed. We are now Swiftwater technicians, as certified by the state of North Carolina.
Punishment Regardless of Fact
The Border Patrol agents involved in the so-called 'whipping' incident will be punished, in spite of the fact that they do not carry whips, the so-called whips proved to be reins, and they did not whip anyone in any case. The Biden administration will issue some sort of 'administrative' punishment -- loss of rank or pay, I imagine -- since there are no facts that would ground a criminal or even a civil one.
The Biden administration is also moving to 'take legal action' of some sort against an independent coin vendor who decided to mint a commemorative coin of the incident. However offensive such a coin may be, it's hard for me to see how there isn't a First Amendment right to mint one if you really wanted to do so. It's artistic expression, which doesn't have to be in good taste to be protected; and it could even be political expression (e.g. of support for harsh measures against illegal immigration), which is especially protected by the First Amendment regardless of whether the views are appropriate or offensive.
Shared Reality?
An analyst at CNN suggests that the January 6th hearings are 'testing whether Americans can agree on a shared reality," or if -- instead -- tribalism will reign. The problem is that those hearings are a show trial with only establishment voices being allowed to describe the 'shared reality.' What is really being tested is whether America will once again submit itself to elite preferences about how we should view the reality we live in. (I'm not entirely sure they believe it themselves -- at this point they must know the whole Trump/Russia thing was a mock-up -- but it is important that we do.)
Americans can probably all agree that it has been raining in Yellowstone, and hot in Texas and the Deep South. It's too much to ask that they should all believe the same people who have staged one such hearing after another, from Mueller to the two impeachments to this. It's a drama, not a reality.
In this drama, the heroes are the Democratic leadership acting in support of intelligence and Federal law enforcement communities in their tireless efforts to stop Donald Trump; the villain, of course, is Donald Trump. Now Trump is a buffoon, as I've always maintained, and regularly says and does careless or stupid things (though he also managed to do some surprisingly solid things as President, chiefly by ignoring the establishment view; when he acceded to it, it inevitably hurt both him and the country). This 'criminal referral' they are promising at the hearing is just another bite at the apple.
Yes, some crimes were committed on January 6th. Almost all of them were misdemeanors. The only procedural outcome that was changed by the riot was that the objection to the certification of the election was dropped and no evidence heard before the vote. The vote was delayed a few hours. The world did not end.
Yes, it probably wouldn't have happened if Trump had been smart enough to hold his protest somewhere besides right by Congress. However, the people who started the riot never went to his protest -- they were already at Congress.
And yes, the FBI's behavior here as in Michigan invites investigation into whether they were here as there engaged in entrapment and/or incitement. Also in the Trump/Russia business, no? Also in the Flynn affair.
Share that reality. Donald Trump is just an old reality TV show and former president, not the chief enemy of the United States of America. He probably won't be president again, but making a martyr out of him turns him from Old News into Headline News. Perversely, his best chance lies with these idiots staging their show.
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