George Carlin was one of those entertainers I thought would be around forever. He has always been around since I knew what a comedian was. When I first heard Class Clown, and he talked about drinking milk and having it come up your nose, I laughed so hard I thought I’d break a rib.
Can you call a comedian a genius? Maybe a comic genius is appropriate. I think Carlin was one. He was fearless and often hysterically, gut wrenchingly funny. Was he also indecent, as the government claimed. Well, yeah, by most of our standards, but that was his point. Paraphrasing him, these are just words and we give them what meaning we will and make some “bad” and some “good” even though there is nothing wrong with them in themselves.
His genius lay in his word play, his prodigious memory and his ability to see inside our frigid culture bound souls and point out the absurdities. I make no bones about it, some of his material was too much more me and I had to turn the channel. Too many secretions and bad smells. But, admittedly, people like me were his target, those of us hung up about bodily functions. Although I laughed ‘til I cried during the bean scene in Blazing Saddles because of its irreverence, normally bathroom humor just didn’t do it for me and my own normally offensive language is free of rectal references (basically, I’m a “fuck” guy). Despite this, I would still put Carlin up near the very top of stand up comedians. He was original, he was insightful and he was just funny.
Not only was he near the top, but he was up there for about 40 years. Though that is clearly not near the record (how long did Bob Hope and George Burns do it?), most comedians, once successful, left it for the higher paying movies and tv work. Carlin did a little of that – one tv show I remember of which I cannot remember the name (was he a cab driver?) and little bits like in Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure. Oh, and there was his miniature train conductor on a kids show about trains – Shining Time Station.
I just saw this on the web, originally uploaded (from where?) by someone named Kevin Armstrong:
"I want to live my next life backwards:
You start out dead and get that out of the way.
Then you wake up in a nursing home feeling better every day.
Then you get kicked out for being too healthy. Enjoy your retirement and collect your pension.
Then when you start work, you get a gold watch on your first day.
You work 40 years until you're too young to work.
You get ready for High School: drink alcohol, party, and you're generally promiscuous.
Then you go to primary school, you become a kid, you play, and you have no responsibilities.
Then you become a baby, and then ...
You spend your last 9 months floating peacefully in luxury, in Spa-like conditions - central heating, room service on tap, and then...You finish off as an orgasm.
I rest my case."
Carlin was so original, and his own style so distinctive, that I have often seen iconoclastic humor posted on the web falsely attributed to him and I can only hope that the material the above is his.
My favorite Carlin bit has to do with children (taken from http://harmful.cat-v.org/society/children/ fuck_the_children). Living in New York, where children are raised with the presumption that they are royalty, the following bit just hit the spot. I not only laughed the whole way through, but was mentally saying “yes, yes, yes” the whole time. Comedy may be funny for many reasons, but one reason is when someone says something true that no one wants to say outloud. Not too many comedians would have the courage to go here. Penis and girlfriend jokes are just much safer. Since it's stand up, there is more than one version, but here's one (to which I replaced a few lines the site took out):
“Something else I'm getting tired of in this country is all this stupid talk I have to listen to about children. That's all you hear about anymore, children: "Help the children, save the children, protect the children." You know what I say? Fuck the children! They're getting entirely too much attention. And I know what some of you are thinking: " Jesus, he's not going to attack children, is he?" Yes he is! He's going to attack children. And remember, this is Mr. Conductor talking; I know what I'm talking about. And I also know that all you boring single dads and working moms, who think you're such fucking heros, aren't gonna like this, but somebody's gotta tell you for your own good: your children are overrated and overvalued, and you've turned them into little cult objects. You have a child fetish, and it's not healthy. And don't give me all that weak shit, "Well, I love my children." Fuck you! Everybody loves their children; it doesn't make you special. : : : John Wayne Gacy loved his children. Yes, he did. That's not what I'm talking about. What I'm talking about is this constant, mindless yammering in the media, this neurotic fixation that suggests that somehow everything--everything--has to revolve around the lives of children. It's completely out of balance. Listen, there are a couple of things about kids you have to remember. First of all, they're not all cute. In fact, if you look at 'em real close, most of them are rather unpleasant looking. And a lot of them don't smell too good either. The little ones in particular seem to have a kind of urine and sour-milk combination that I don't care for at all. Stay with me on this folks, the sooner you face it the better off your going to be. Second, premise: not all chidren are smart and clever. Got that? Kids are like any other group of people: a few winners, a whole lot of losers! This country is filled with loser kids who simply...aren't...going anywhere! And there's nothing you can do about it, folks. Nothing! You can't save them all. You can't do it. You gotta let 'em go; you gotta cut 'em loose; you gotta stop over-protecting them, because your making 'em too soft. Today's kids are way too soft. : : : For one thing, there's too much emphasis on safety and safety equipment: childproof medicine bottles, fireproof pajamas, child restraints, car seats. And helmets! Bicycle, baseball, skateboard, scooter helmets. Kids have to wear helmets now for everything but jerking off. Grown-ups have taken all the fun out of being a kid, just to save a few thousand lives. It's pathetic. It's pathetic. What's happened is, these baby boomers, these soft, fruity babyboomers, have raised an entire generation of soft, fruity kids who aren't even allowed hazardous toys, for Chrissakes! What ever happened to natural selection? Survival of the fittest? The kid who swallows too many marbles doesn't grow up to have kids of his own. Simple stuff. Nature knows best! Another bunch of ignorant bullshit about your children: school uniforms. Bad theory! The idea that if kids wear uniforms to school, it helps keep order. Hey! Don't these schools do enough damage makin' all these children think alike? Now they're gonna get 'em to look alike, too? And it's not even a new idea; I first saw it in old newsreels from the 1930s, but it was hard to understand, because the narration was in German! But the uniforms looked beautiful. And the children did everything they were told and never questioned authority. Gee, I wonder why someone would want to put our children in uniforms. Can't imagine. And one more item about children: this superstitous nonsense of blaming tobacco companies for kids who smoke. Listem! Kids don't smoke because a camel in sunglasses tells them to. They smoke for the same reasons adults do, because it's an enjoyable activity that relieves anxiety and depression. And you'd be anxious and depressed too if you had to put up with these pathetic, insecure, yuppie parents who enroll you in college before you've figured out which side of the play pen smells the worst and then fill you with Ritalin to get you in a mood they approve of, and drag you all overtown in search of empty, meaningless structure: Little League, Cub Scouts, swimming, soccer, karate, piano, bagpipes, watercolors, witchcraft, glassblowing, and dildo practice. It's absurd. : : : They even have "play dates", for Christ sake! Playing is now done by appointment! But it's true. A lot of these striving anal parents are burning their kids out on structure. I think what every child needs and ought to have every day is two hours of daydreaming. Plain old daydreaming. Turn off the internet, the CD-ROMS, and the computer games and let them stare at a tree for a couple of hours. Every now and then they actually come up with one of their own ideas. You want to know how to help your kids? Leave them the fuck alone.”
Carlin had a great comic voice, and maybe this is funnier with his gruff sarcastic tones. So better still, here's a link with him doing it himself. I just listened twice and it doesn't get old fast: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=niQ73ZlDxuI
Goodbye, George. You will not get the send off that Tim Russert did, but he, and no shot at him, was safe, maybe Mr. Safe. Carlin became famous by getting arrested for telling the truth in a way that made most people laugh, but made others uncomfortable. Dangerous. When Russert's kid did his eulogy he pictured his dad up in heaven interviewing Hamilton and Burr. I picture Giordano Bruno, Bob Hope, Mark Twain even Jesus and Buddha and all the other iconoclasts sitting around cracking up listening to Carlin doing his seven dirty words routine. "This guy gets it".
Tuesday, June 24, 2008
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
The Hammer of Witches
Welcome to Metaphysical Booknotes, the show that Raises Dead Issues With Dead People.
It wouldn’t be unfair to say that this show has catered to dead white men for the most part. So, to make up for the overemphasis just a little, today we celebrate women in history with great affection in one of their greatest role’s – the everlovin’ witch.
Today’s interview is ironically with a dead white man by the name of Jacob Sprenger, one of the two authors of the Malleus Maleficarum. Latin for The Hammer of Witches. The MM was written by them slightly before before Columbus sailed the ocean blue by Sprenger and his partner, Heinrich Kramer. These two Dominican inquisitors couldn’t even get along with each other, but they sure did know how to identify, prosecute and execute witches, which is the subject of their book and our interview today.
Originally condemned by the church for going against the dogma of Catholic demonology, Kramer eventually became a successful lecturer and inquisitor. Unfortunately, the older Sprenger dropped dead a few years later, but, thankfully, is here in our studio right now. Mr.Sprenger has agreed to speak on this long dead subject only through direct quotation from the MM:
INTERVIEWER: I have always wondered why there were so many more witches than warlocks. Is that a fair characterization?
JS: "[A] greater number of witches is found in the fragile feminine sex than among men; it is indeed a fact that it were idle to contradict, since it is accredited by actual experience, apart from the verbal testimony of credibly witnesses."
INTERVIEWER: So, is it that just that women are plain evil?
JS: "When they are governed by a good spirit, they are most excellent in virtue; but when they are governed by an evil spirit, they indulge the worst possible vices."
INTERVIEWER: Just how bad can an evil woman get?
JS: "There is no head above the head of a serpent: and there is no wrath above the wrath of a woman. . . . . . All wickedness is but little to the wickedness of a woman."
INTERVIEWER: I suppose that just the possibility that your wife is a witch would be grounds for divorce:
JS: "What else is woman but a foe to friendship, an unescapable punishment, a necessary evil, a natural temptation, a desirable calamity, a domestic danger, a delectable detriment, an evil of nature, painted with fair colours! Therefore if it be a sin to divorce her when she ought to be kept, it is indeed a necessary torture; for either we commit adultery by divorcing her, or we must endure daily strife."
INTERVIEWER: Strange. I would think it would be a bad idea to keep a witch for a wife.
JS: "No might of the flames or the swollen winds, no deadly weapon, is so much to be feared as the lust and hatred of a woman who has been divorced from the marriage bed."
INTERVIEWER: I have a difficult time swallowing this whole premise. Why would women be worse than men?
JS: "The many lusts of men lead them into one sin, but the lust of women leads them into all sins; for the root of all woman's vices is avarice. And Seneca says in his Tragedies: A woman either loves or hates; there is no third grade. And the tears of woman are a deception, for they may spring from true grief, or they may be a snare. When a woman thinks alone, she thinks evil."
INTERVIEWER: So, lust is the problem. I see. Is that it?
JS: "[Women] are more credulous; and since the chief aim of the devil is to corrupt faith, therefore he rather attacks them. . . . The second reason is, that women are naturally more impressionable, and more ready to receive the influence of a disembodied spirit; and that when they use this quality well they are very good, but when they use it ill they are very evil."
INTERVIEWER: I take it you aren’t married.
JS: "I had rather dwell with a lion and a dragon than to keep house with a wicked woman."
INTERVIEWER: I still don’t know. Why can't women just understand the pitfalls of witchery and avoid it?
JS: "Women are intellectually like children."
INTERVIEWER: So, you think it is a matter of intelligence?
JS: "But the natural reason is that she is more carnal than a man, as is clear from her many carnal abominations."
INTERVIEWER: You act as if women are monsters. Yet, very often they seem much more empathetic than men.
JS: "When a woman weeps she weaves snares. "
INTERVIEWER: I suppose, from your religious background, you would believe that faith would be a safe haven for women.
JS: "[A] wicked woman is by her nature quicker to waver in her faith, and consequently quicker to abjure the faith, which is the root of witchcraft."
INTERVIEWER: Interesting. Now, how would you say it was best to go about protecting yourself from these witches?
JS: "[T]he exorcisms of the Church are . . . entirely efficacious remedies for preserving oneself from the injuries of witches."
INTERVIEWER: I hear that blessed salt works wonders with witches?
JS: "Now it happened in the city of Spires, in the same year that this book was begun, that a certain devout woman held conversation with a suspected witch, and, after the manner of women, they used abusive words to each other. But in the night she wished to put her little suckling child in its cradle, and remembered her encounter that day with the suspected witch. So, fearing some danger to the child, she placed consecrated herbs under it, sprinkled it with Holy Water, put a little Blessed Salt to its lips, signed it with the Sign of the Cross, and diligently secured the cradle. About the middle of the night she heard the child crying, and, as women do, wished to embrace the child, and life the cradle on to her bed. She lifted the candle, indeed, but could not embrace the child, because he was not there. The poor woman, in terror, and bitterly weeping for the loss of her child, lit a light, and found the child in a corner under a chair, crying but unhurt."
INTERVIEWER: So . . . then you do recommend the salt?
JS: "In Ratisbon a man was being tempted by the devil in the form of a woman to copulate, and became greatly disturbed when the devil would not desist. But it came into the poor man's mind that he ought to defend himself by taking Blessed Salt, as he had heard in a sermon. So, he took some Blessed Salt on entering the bath-room; and the woman looked fiercely at him, and, cursing whatever devil had taught him to do this, suddenly disappeared. For the devil can, with God's permission, present himself either in the form of a witch, or by possessing the body of an actual witch."
INTERVIEWER: I’ll take that as a yes. What do you recommend doing with a witch when you catch one?
JS: "First, that her house should be searched as thoroughly as possible, in all holes and corners and chests, top and bottom; and if she is a noted witch, then without doubt, unless she has previously hidden them, there will be found various instruments of witchcraft. . . .
A second precaution is to be observed, not only at this point but during the whole process, by the Judge and all his assessors; namely, that they must not allow themselves to be touched physically by the witch, especially in any contract of their bare arms or hands.
The third precaution to be observed . . . is that the hair should be shaved from every part of her body. The reason for this is the same as that for stripping her of her clothes . . . for in order to preserve their power of silence they are in the habit of hiding some superstitious object in their clothes or in their hair, or even in the most secret parts of the their bodies which must not be named."
INTERVIEWER: Sounds reasonably modern. Let’s move on, though. So, if you take these precautions, the average witch can be made to confess?
JS: "[T]he devil might, without the use of such charms, so harden the heart of a witch that she is unable to confess her crimes; just as it is often found in the case of other criminals, no matter how great the tortures to which they are exposed, or how much they are convicted by the evidence of the facts and of witnesses."
INTERVIEWER: But how do they remain silent under torture?
JS: "This can be made clear from the example of a certain witch in the town of Hagenau . . . . She used to obtain this gift of silence in the following manner: she killed a newly-born first-born male child who had not been baptized, and having roasted it in an oven together with other matters which it is not expedient to mention, ground it to powder and ashes; and if any witch or criminal carried about him some of this substance he would in no way be able to confess his crimes."
INTERVIEWER: Let me try and sum up. It seems clear to me that the devil, the ultimate source of all this evil, is brought about by lustful women and that without them, we would not have evil. Or, have I overstated it?
JS: "[I]f it be asked whether the devil cannot inflict injury upon men and beasts without the means of a woman being seen in a vision or by her touch, we answer that he can, when God permits it. But the permission of God is more readily granted in the case of a creature that was dedicated to God, but by denying the faith has consented to other horrible crimes; and therefore the devil more often uses such means to harm creatures. Further, we may say that, although the devil can work without a witch, he yet very much prefers to work with one, for the many reasons which we showed earlier in this work."
INTERVIEWER: We are almost out of time, but, first, I’d like to give you a gift for coming in and talking with us – a red hot iron. I think you know what to do with this, don’t you?
JS: "Formal rules for initiating a process of justice were set down: how it should be conducted and the method of pronouncing sentence; when to use the trial by red-hot iron and other methods of torture for extracting confessions."
INTERVIEWER: Thanks. I hope the women in our audience appreciated a day dedicated especially to them. Come back next time when we interview Torqemada with tortures you can do in your own home.
It wouldn’t be unfair to say that this show has catered to dead white men for the most part. So, to make up for the overemphasis just a little, today we celebrate women in history with great affection in one of their greatest role’s – the everlovin’ witch.
Today’s interview is ironically with a dead white man by the name of Jacob Sprenger, one of the two authors of the Malleus Maleficarum. Latin for The Hammer of Witches. The MM was written by them slightly before before Columbus sailed the ocean blue by Sprenger and his partner, Heinrich Kramer. These two Dominican inquisitors couldn’t even get along with each other, but they sure did know how to identify, prosecute and execute witches, which is the subject of their book and our interview today.
Originally condemned by the church for going against the dogma of Catholic demonology, Kramer eventually became a successful lecturer and inquisitor. Unfortunately, the older Sprenger dropped dead a few years later, but, thankfully, is here in our studio right now. Mr.Sprenger has agreed to speak on this long dead subject only through direct quotation from the MM:
INTERVIEWER: I have always wondered why there were so many more witches than warlocks. Is that a fair characterization?
JS: "[A] greater number of witches is found in the fragile feminine sex than among men; it is indeed a fact that it were idle to contradict, since it is accredited by actual experience, apart from the verbal testimony of credibly witnesses."
INTERVIEWER: So, is it that just that women are plain evil?
JS: "When they are governed by a good spirit, they are most excellent in virtue; but when they are governed by an evil spirit, they indulge the worst possible vices."
INTERVIEWER: Just how bad can an evil woman get?
JS: "There is no head above the head of a serpent: and there is no wrath above the wrath of a woman. . . . . . All wickedness is but little to the wickedness of a woman."
INTERVIEWER: I suppose that just the possibility that your wife is a witch would be grounds for divorce:
JS: "What else is woman but a foe to friendship, an unescapable punishment, a necessary evil, a natural temptation, a desirable calamity, a domestic danger, a delectable detriment, an evil of nature, painted with fair colours! Therefore if it be a sin to divorce her when she ought to be kept, it is indeed a necessary torture; for either we commit adultery by divorcing her, or we must endure daily strife."
INTERVIEWER: Strange. I would think it would be a bad idea to keep a witch for a wife.
JS: "No might of the flames or the swollen winds, no deadly weapon, is so much to be feared as the lust and hatred of a woman who has been divorced from the marriage bed."
INTERVIEWER: I have a difficult time swallowing this whole premise. Why would women be worse than men?
JS: "The many lusts of men lead them into one sin, but the lust of women leads them into all sins; for the root of all woman's vices is avarice. And Seneca says in his Tragedies: A woman either loves or hates; there is no third grade. And the tears of woman are a deception, for they may spring from true grief, or they may be a snare. When a woman thinks alone, she thinks evil."
INTERVIEWER: So, lust is the problem. I see. Is that it?
JS: "[Women] are more credulous; and since the chief aim of the devil is to corrupt faith, therefore he rather attacks them. . . . The second reason is, that women are naturally more impressionable, and more ready to receive the influence of a disembodied spirit; and that when they use this quality well they are very good, but when they use it ill they are very evil."
INTERVIEWER: I take it you aren’t married.
JS: "I had rather dwell with a lion and a dragon than to keep house with a wicked woman."
INTERVIEWER: I still don’t know. Why can't women just understand the pitfalls of witchery and avoid it?
JS: "Women are intellectually like children."
INTERVIEWER: So, you think it is a matter of intelligence?
JS: "But the natural reason is that she is more carnal than a man, as is clear from her many carnal abominations."
INTERVIEWER: You act as if women are monsters. Yet, very often they seem much more empathetic than men.
JS: "When a woman weeps she weaves snares. "
INTERVIEWER: I suppose, from your religious background, you would believe that faith would be a safe haven for women.
JS: "[A] wicked woman is by her nature quicker to waver in her faith, and consequently quicker to abjure the faith, which is the root of witchcraft."
INTERVIEWER: Interesting. Now, how would you say it was best to go about protecting yourself from these witches?
JS: "[T]he exorcisms of the Church are . . . entirely efficacious remedies for preserving oneself from the injuries of witches."
INTERVIEWER: I hear that blessed salt works wonders with witches?
JS: "Now it happened in the city of Spires, in the same year that this book was begun, that a certain devout woman held conversation with a suspected witch, and, after the manner of women, they used abusive words to each other. But in the night she wished to put her little suckling child in its cradle, and remembered her encounter that day with the suspected witch. So, fearing some danger to the child, she placed consecrated herbs under it, sprinkled it with Holy Water, put a little Blessed Salt to its lips, signed it with the Sign of the Cross, and diligently secured the cradle. About the middle of the night she heard the child crying, and, as women do, wished to embrace the child, and life the cradle on to her bed. She lifted the candle, indeed, but could not embrace the child, because he was not there. The poor woman, in terror, and bitterly weeping for the loss of her child, lit a light, and found the child in a corner under a chair, crying but unhurt."
INTERVIEWER: So . . . then you do recommend the salt?
JS: "In Ratisbon a man was being tempted by the devil in the form of a woman to copulate, and became greatly disturbed when the devil would not desist. But it came into the poor man's mind that he ought to defend himself by taking Blessed Salt, as he had heard in a sermon. So, he took some Blessed Salt on entering the bath-room; and the woman looked fiercely at him, and, cursing whatever devil had taught him to do this, suddenly disappeared. For the devil can, with God's permission, present himself either in the form of a witch, or by possessing the body of an actual witch."
INTERVIEWER: I’ll take that as a yes. What do you recommend doing with a witch when you catch one?
JS: "First, that her house should be searched as thoroughly as possible, in all holes and corners and chests, top and bottom; and if she is a noted witch, then without doubt, unless she has previously hidden them, there will be found various instruments of witchcraft. . . .
A second precaution is to be observed, not only at this point but during the whole process, by the Judge and all his assessors; namely, that they must not allow themselves to be touched physically by the witch, especially in any contract of their bare arms or hands.
The third precaution to be observed . . . is that the hair should be shaved from every part of her body. The reason for this is the same as that for stripping her of her clothes . . . for in order to preserve their power of silence they are in the habit of hiding some superstitious object in their clothes or in their hair, or even in the most secret parts of the their bodies which must not be named."
INTERVIEWER: Sounds reasonably modern. Let’s move on, though. So, if you take these precautions, the average witch can be made to confess?
JS: "[T]he devil might, without the use of such charms, so harden the heart of a witch that she is unable to confess her crimes; just as it is often found in the case of other criminals, no matter how great the tortures to which they are exposed, or how much they are convicted by the evidence of the facts and of witnesses."
INTERVIEWER: But how do they remain silent under torture?
JS: "This can be made clear from the example of a certain witch in the town of Hagenau . . . . She used to obtain this gift of silence in the following manner: she killed a newly-born first-born male child who had not been baptized, and having roasted it in an oven together with other matters which it is not expedient to mention, ground it to powder and ashes; and if any witch or criminal carried about him some of this substance he would in no way be able to confess his crimes."
INTERVIEWER: Let me try and sum up. It seems clear to me that the devil, the ultimate source of all this evil, is brought about by lustful women and that without them, we would not have evil. Or, have I overstated it?
JS: "[I]f it be asked whether the devil cannot inflict injury upon men and beasts without the means of a woman being seen in a vision or by her touch, we answer that he can, when God permits it. But the permission of God is more readily granted in the case of a creature that was dedicated to God, but by denying the faith has consented to other horrible crimes; and therefore the devil more often uses such means to harm creatures. Further, we may say that, although the devil can work without a witch, he yet very much prefers to work with one, for the many reasons which we showed earlier in this work."
INTERVIEWER: We are almost out of time, but, first, I’d like to give you a gift for coming in and talking with us – a red hot iron. I think you know what to do with this, don’t you?
JS: "Formal rules for initiating a process of justice were set down: how it should be conducted and the method of pronouncing sentence; when to use the trial by red-hot iron and other methods of torture for extracting confessions."
INTERVIEWER: Thanks. I hope the women in our audience appreciated a day dedicated especially to them. Come back next time when we interview Torqemada with tortures you can do in your own home.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
Political update for June, 2008
Religion and the presidency
The most telling statement on presidential politics in the last few years was written in a book on religion (or, more accurately, against religion):
“Of course, religious moderation consists in not being too sure about what happens after death. This is a reasonable attitude, given the paucity of evidence on the subject. But religious moderation still represents a failure to criticize the unreasonable (and dangerous) certainty of others. As a consequence of our silence on these matters, we live in a country in which a person cannot get elected president if he openly doubts the existence of heaven and hell. This is truly remarkable, given that there is no other body of ‘knowledge’ that we require our political leaders to master. Even a hairstylist must pass a licensing exam before plying his
trade in the United States, and yet those given the power to make war and national policy – those whose decisions will inevitably affect human life for generations – are not expected to know anything in particular before setting to work. They do not have to be political scientists, economists, or even lawyers; they need not have studied international relations, military history, resource management, civil engineering, or any other field of knowledge that might be brought to bear in the governance of a modern superpower; they need only be expert fund-raisers, comport themselves well on television, and be indulgent of certain myths. In our next presidential election, an actor who reads his Bible would almost certainly defeat a rocket scientist who does not. Could there be any clearer indication that we are allowing unreason and otherworldliness to govern our affairs.” Sam Harris – The End of Faith, p 39, paperback edition.
Any doubt as to his accuracy is blown away by the importance religion has played so far in this election. The charismatic Barack Obama has faced his toughest roadblocks from his religious choices, not his political ones (although we probably have not heard the last about William Ayres).
I’ve made it clear hear that I prefer John McCain as president, mostly because he seems the most centrist of the candidates, and that is my particular raison d’étre. But, honestly, if either Obama or McCain wins, I will not be crying in my electoral soup.
Although I try very hard not to let the political smear attacks affect me, I have to admit that I was a little shaken in my beliefs that it was all nonsense, when I saw the videotape of Father Pfleger mocking Hillary Clinton in Obama’s church.
First, just to get it out of the way – what is the matter with that guy? Was he raised in a black family or neighborhood so that his mannerisms and vocalizations have become an homage to black preachers? He reminded me of young white kids who emulate black culture and call themselves wiggers. He and they are free to do what they like, and he might even have a lot of good things to say when he is not being political, but it just seems so contrived and silly. Not to advocate even more sensitivity in our wacky culture, but if blackface is considered offensive, why isn’t mimicking the voice and mannerisms of black preachers?
But, sitting here in my chair, listening to Father Pfleger mock Clinton, and carry on to the cheers of the congregation, I did start to think – wait a minute, so it is not just Jeremiah Wright being “bombastic”. This seems to be the tenure of the church. They congregation is cheering. Now, I actually have all the respect in the world for blacks feeling that they have gotten the short end of the stick, more so than other minorities in America, and I would understand the pride they would feel if a black man was elected president.
Although I will not cast my vote on race, I admit I would feel good if Obama won to the extent that it would say something about the growth of America racially. Somewhat defensively, I add my recognition that some people would not be able to read that sentence without forgetting the first part of it, but, that’s what happens when you write about politics.
Still, I would not want to have Obama win if I have the feeling that those he would choose to be around him, even if out of patience and sympathy, would have the bitterness and lack of reason demonstrated by Wright and Pfleger. In no way do I believe that Obama, who has denounced (and rejected) those statements, actually endorses either man’s comments. Nor does it necessarily raise questions as to his judgment. But, it does raise questions about his patience and closeness with some people who may be well outside of the mainstream of American thought. Having said of myself on many occasions, that I have an amazing capacity for people who do me no good whatsoever, I know from what I speak. Some of us have difficulty ridding ourselves of pests, and, it is especially problematic with presidents.
And, of course, I realize that this is what partisans on McCain’s side want me to think, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be true.
I understand why Obama had to distance himself politically from his church and also understand why he did it in a very political way (acting as if it were non-political). But, it just shows how presidential politics twists people. Who leaves a church by press conference? Why didn’t he just stop going to that church and start going to another one without comment? Isn’t that what most people, almost everyone, would do?
Obama is in a religious pickle which will be preyed upon by Republican partisans. He cannot trash the so-called “black church” or even people like Wright or Pfleger (who apologized, but clearly was not truthful in saying he meant no offense) with abandon because he cannot risk losing the support of much of the base that won the Democratic nomination for him. To the contrary, he hopes, by greatly increasing their participation in voting in the general election, to build upon it.
On the other hand, he cannot just allow white voters, not including those suffering from “white guilt” or young men and women instilled with the ideology of change for change sake, to loathe him either for not rejecting these men in some respects. Politically, he has handled it well, perhaps better than anyone else can. As a matter of character, though, he has failed, and it must gall him. He has had to choose politics over his friends, and that can never be an act without consequences.
I do not mean to suggest that Obama is alone with his religious problems. Our national obsession with the religion of our leaders has caused a similar problem with John McCain, which however, he wisely handled before the campaigns really heated up.
Like both Obama and Clinton, McCain has come out against gay marriage while supporting civil unions. Civil unions are meant to be legal equivalents to marriage. The objection to them seems to be religious and cultural ones. My personal belief, without any fact to support me other than my own impression of the candidates, is that they are all lying to us, and possibly, just possibly, to themselves about their true position. I just don’t believe that any of them really cares if two men or two women call their relationship a marriage. It goes against the general tenor of their beliefs. However, they all have probably heard from advisors that backing the very unpopular gay marriage would be a big mistake polically. McCain has the worst problem as his many in his own party doubt him on social values.
McCain was a life long Episcopalian. However, that church has begun to support the idea of gay marriage. Quietly, at some unknown point, McCain switched his church to that of the anti-gay marriage, Baptist church. Smoothly, quietly and under the radar. Now, of course, I cannot say for a certainty that there were not other factors. But one need not be more than the tiniest bit cynical to believe that his switch before a run for president to a church popular in the south that is known to be more anti-gay marriage (like the majority of Americans) was politically motivated, no matter what he tells himself or us.
A campaign based even in part on religion will bring out the worst in Americans. Because Obama is bi-racial (which I have come to belief is a political, not scientific term) race will also play a big roll in the campaign. I spent most of my life on relatively liberal Long Island. Yet, I know people there who have already openly determined not to vote for Obama just because he is black, or, heavens to Betsy, because it might make black people think “who they are” (sorry, but that is the expression I’ve heard – it seems to mean “think they are something special”).
I don’t want to say that I’ve heard many people say things like that as it has only been a few. But since I don’t talk to all that many people about politics, you can probably extrapolate it out to our voting population. It will add up to a lot of people.
I also know people who admit they will not vote for him because he has an Arabic name. Now, I listened to Jeremiah Wright speak and he said a lot of wacky things, but one thing he said that made sense I (and that was about it) was – “Arabic is a language, not a religion”. There are, as we know, some people who have no trouble juggling the ideas both that Obama is a Muslim (gasp) or a terrorist sympathizer, and, at the same time, a racist and intolerant Christian. We can safely assume that those people were not going to vote for Obama anyway unless he was running against Osama bin Laden.
Racism and religious mumbo jumbo on both sides of our political spectrum will not only rear its head, but like a hydra monster, grow two back for every one cut off. From watching the primaries, we know that many Obama’s supporters will challenge any criticism of him as racist, will use his ethnicity for their purposes, but cry “code words” or “hate speech” if McCain supporters mention it, and will insist that racism was the main reason if they lose (it might be one reason). We also know that McCain’s supporters will play up Obama’s Arabic name and his relationship with Wright and Pfleger, prey upon white people’s fears of a black president and suggest, or actually say, that he will have too much sympathy for America’s enemies, if not be an outright Manchurian candidate.
They both know better, say they want something different. Sadly, they have already started unfairly attacking each other and it will just get worse. Whoever wins (and I still believe it will be McCain) will end up tarnished by a large percentage of the population when he is sworn in. But, isn’t that the way if usually goes?
THE VP DECISION
There is rarely such hoopla about nothing than who will be the vice presidential nominees. If the popularity or good reputation of presidential candidates were important, then Mike Dukakis, who picked Lloyd Bentsen as his running mate, would have beaten George H. W. Bush, who chose Dan Quayle, a young running mate who was quickly turned into an iconic laughing stock by the media.
The media loves the guessing games. It takes months of air time where every barely employed pundit on the Beltway takes a few guesses. Some of their premises amuse. Often they try and pick someone who they think will help them win some small state even though they have learned time and time again that it doesn’t work. Sometimes they try and pick someone who brings something to the ticket that the candidate doesn’t have, like foreign policy experience or economic experience. Not only do voters generally not care, but everyone knows the president has many foreign policy and economic advisors and doesn’t need a vice president expert in either field. All that is important is that the VP candidate not be offensive to anyone who doesn’t already hate everyone not from their party, and be loyal. So, who cares? Only the media.
Resurrecting a past prediction, Mike Huckabee might be a good choice for McCain given his better conservative credentials. I use to think Duncan Hunter would be too, but his campaigning for president showed him too dour. There is the problem of evangelicals staying home on election day. However, for the sake of the independents both sides are fighting for, the Republicans don’t need two old white guys in the election of “change”. Still, McCain’s best choice would be Michael Steele of Maryland, the chairman of the RNC and a past candidate for Senator (he lost, but beat expectations). This intelligent and genial man also happens to be black, which would be a terrific antidote to those who want a minority to have a shot at a major post. Please don’t tell me that any candidate is above that.
Democrats have a tougher problem. Initially, I thought that Bill Richardson, accomplished and personable, would make a good VP selection. He thought so too, no doubt. However, he has now alienated the Clinton wing of the party and would present a ticket with two minorities. Probably not a good idea.
Who else? Sam Nunn’s name is being batted around. Has anyone asked him? A former senator from Georgia with loads of foreign affairs experience and respect from both sides of the aisle, he might be considered just too conservative by many Democrats (plus, he is almost as old as McCain). For me, his non-partisan ideology makes him desirable, but many people don’t look at it like that.
For similar reasons, Jim Webb of Virginia would probably make an excellent choice. Military man, former Reagan appointee, Southerner and reputation for toughness. He might do the trick.
GAS PROBLEMS
Get ready for fights at gas stations, gas lines at places selling discount (I’ve already waited ten minutes a month ago at a large supermarket chain gas station) and price gouging, always discovered too late, but inevitable.
What’s the answer? Everything. More drilling (hopefully with environmental care, but that is the risk we take for having a petroleum based society; we can always stop; no one wants to), conservation (isn’t that what you do personally?); a stronger dollar – the weakness in the dollar helps our exports but hurts with imports; investment in alternative energy - even enemies of nuclear energy now concede it may be the answer for the foreseeable future unless you are willing to pay $6 a gallon; reasonable supervision of energy companies forming cartels, or cornering the market, without insane overregulation of investors trying to make money by being smarter than other people.
Many chickens are coming home to roost, but not the chickens Jeremiah Wright was talking about. It is the belief in American “exceptionalism” in areas where we are just not exceptional, a feeling of entitlement on the part of many citizens to a level of luxury that is not reasonable or sustainable over the long turn, and refusal to sacrifice, address our culture of leisure, and lack of serious educational ambition by American parents, that will undo us. Gas prices are a symptom. In order to pull itself out of this funk, America either needs a true cultural change and probably much upheaval.
CABLE NEWS
Well, I almost give up. I used to watch CNN years ago, but it just got so boring. Then I watched Fox until I just couldn’t take the partisanship anymore. Switching to MSNBC, I was delighted that they actually seemed to balance the ideology. However, since the rise of uber-liberals, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, it is getting more like talk radio all the time (her real job). Add Chris Matthews, another interesting guy, but who is so anti-Clinton, he can’t see his own bias. Moreover, his beating up of his guests with glee isn’t interesting or fun. It’s painful to watch. And then he replays it over and over.
All of them are talented (Olbermann and Maddow, for instance, can riff on Bush pretty much forever) but just so partisan that I have the same lack of patience for them that I do with Rush Limbaugh. Fun for a little while and then . . . oh, come on.
This mixture of ideologies has created a lot of tension on screen. Chris Matthews had a meltdown with Joe Scarborough’s co-host, Mika Brzezinski, one morning (she annoys me sometimes too, but she was right -- it did seem he was endorsing Obama). Keith Olbermann supposedly refuses to do the lead-in to Dan Abrams’ show and Scarborough clearly despises Rachel Maddow, once doing a psycho-bolt off another show during a break after feuding with her. That sounds like it might be fun, but I find it embarrassing and awkward as they don't let you know how the conflict was resolved, if at all. I've even emailed MSNBC about it. No answer, obviously.
Moreover, the obvious desire to show respect for minorities has led to a bizarre situation where some hosts treat every idea by a black person, even patently ridiculous ones, seriously. The idea that minorities can't say something idiotic is its own type of racism.
However, MSNBC still my favorite station. Ironically, the conservative ideologues on the station are so pleasant, and have so modified their rancor at most liberal ideas that they are interesting and charming. And there are still moderates on the station who make it bearable.
Still, there are good reasons to watch – Morning Joe Scarborough, who has morphed into a fun loving talk show host that createst the best three great hours on television every morning (although he is absent too often); Pat Buchanan - I know some Jews and liberals will never forgive him, but he is like your grandpa now, and still the sharpest debater and most knowledgeable guy on almost every show he is on; columnist Eugene Robinson is a frequent guest and usually a steady, reasonable voice; Chuck Todd -- the rising star; Tucker Carlson, now a guest (I still can’t believe they took a show away from the best prime time host on cable news, but he was too nice and reasonable); and the charmingly snarky Willie Geist, formerly the comic relief on Tucker and now Morning Joe, where they are expanding his role. I leave out some of the others (I imagine I've been disrespectul to Tim Russert, Andrea Mitchell, Mike Barnicle and others who neither inspire me to watch, nor upset me when I do -- sorry).
Post publication note - Editing this post this next morning, I must add one note. Gen. Wesley Clark's attack on John McCain as being untested for the military aspects of the presidency is just so ridiculous on so many levels, you just have to shake your head and wonder. Two, questions that he was, of course, not asked on the friendly shows he was on -- 1) Who is more prepared to be president from a military/foreign affairs point of view - John McCain or Barack Obama. 2) Which president have we had who had more military and/or foreign affairs experience since Eisenhower. Answer to 1 - Please. You can argue that Obama should still be president despite his lack of experience, which pails compared to McCain, but . . . . 2. Maybe George Bush I, and arguably Nixon, but that's it.
The most telling statement on presidential politics in the last few years was written in a book on religion (or, more accurately, against religion):
“Of course, religious moderation consists in not being too sure about what happens after death. This is a reasonable attitude, given the paucity of evidence on the subject. But religious moderation still represents a failure to criticize the unreasonable (and dangerous) certainty of others. As a consequence of our silence on these matters, we live in a country in which a person cannot get elected president if he openly doubts the existence of heaven and hell. This is truly remarkable, given that there is no other body of ‘knowledge’ that we require our political leaders to master. Even a hairstylist must pass a licensing exam before plying his
trade in the United States, and yet those given the power to make war and national policy – those whose decisions will inevitably affect human life for generations – are not expected to know anything in particular before setting to work. They do not have to be political scientists, economists, or even lawyers; they need not have studied international relations, military history, resource management, civil engineering, or any other field of knowledge that might be brought to bear in the governance of a modern superpower; they need only be expert fund-raisers, comport themselves well on television, and be indulgent of certain myths. In our next presidential election, an actor who reads his Bible would almost certainly defeat a rocket scientist who does not. Could there be any clearer indication that we are allowing unreason and otherworldliness to govern our affairs.” Sam Harris – The End of Faith, p 39, paperback edition.
Any doubt as to his accuracy is blown away by the importance religion has played so far in this election. The charismatic Barack Obama has faced his toughest roadblocks from his religious choices, not his political ones (although we probably have not heard the last about William Ayres).
I’ve made it clear hear that I prefer John McCain as president, mostly because he seems the most centrist of the candidates, and that is my particular raison d’étre. But, honestly, if either Obama or McCain wins, I will not be crying in my electoral soup.
Although I try very hard not to let the political smear attacks affect me, I have to admit that I was a little shaken in my beliefs that it was all nonsense, when I saw the videotape of Father Pfleger mocking Hillary Clinton in Obama’s church.
First, just to get it out of the way – what is the matter with that guy? Was he raised in a black family or neighborhood so that his mannerisms and vocalizations have become an homage to black preachers? He reminded me of young white kids who emulate black culture and call themselves wiggers. He and they are free to do what they like, and he might even have a lot of good things to say when he is not being political, but it just seems so contrived and silly. Not to advocate even more sensitivity in our wacky culture, but if blackface is considered offensive, why isn’t mimicking the voice and mannerisms of black preachers?
But, sitting here in my chair, listening to Father Pfleger mock Clinton, and carry on to the cheers of the congregation, I did start to think – wait a minute, so it is not just Jeremiah Wright being “bombastic”. This seems to be the tenure of the church. They congregation is cheering. Now, I actually have all the respect in the world for blacks feeling that they have gotten the short end of the stick, more so than other minorities in America, and I would understand the pride they would feel if a black man was elected president.
Although I will not cast my vote on race, I admit I would feel good if Obama won to the extent that it would say something about the growth of America racially. Somewhat defensively, I add my recognition that some people would not be able to read that sentence without forgetting the first part of it, but, that’s what happens when you write about politics.
Still, I would not want to have Obama win if I have the feeling that those he would choose to be around him, even if out of patience and sympathy, would have the bitterness and lack of reason demonstrated by Wright and Pfleger. In no way do I believe that Obama, who has denounced (and rejected) those statements, actually endorses either man’s comments. Nor does it necessarily raise questions as to his judgment. But, it does raise questions about his patience and closeness with some people who may be well outside of the mainstream of American thought. Having said of myself on many occasions, that I have an amazing capacity for people who do me no good whatsoever, I know from what I speak. Some of us have difficulty ridding ourselves of pests, and, it is especially problematic with presidents.
And, of course, I realize that this is what partisans on McCain’s side want me to think, but that doesn’t mean it can’t be true.
I understand why Obama had to distance himself politically from his church and also understand why he did it in a very political way (acting as if it were non-political). But, it just shows how presidential politics twists people. Who leaves a church by press conference? Why didn’t he just stop going to that church and start going to another one without comment? Isn’t that what most people, almost everyone, would do?
Obama is in a religious pickle which will be preyed upon by Republican partisans. He cannot trash the so-called “black church” or even people like Wright or Pfleger (who apologized, but clearly was not truthful in saying he meant no offense) with abandon because he cannot risk losing the support of much of the base that won the Democratic nomination for him. To the contrary, he hopes, by greatly increasing their participation in voting in the general election, to build upon it.
On the other hand, he cannot just allow white voters, not including those suffering from “white guilt” or young men and women instilled with the ideology of change for change sake, to loathe him either for not rejecting these men in some respects. Politically, he has handled it well, perhaps better than anyone else can. As a matter of character, though, he has failed, and it must gall him. He has had to choose politics over his friends, and that can never be an act without consequences.
I do not mean to suggest that Obama is alone with his religious problems. Our national obsession with the religion of our leaders has caused a similar problem with John McCain, which however, he wisely handled before the campaigns really heated up.
Like both Obama and Clinton, McCain has come out against gay marriage while supporting civil unions. Civil unions are meant to be legal equivalents to marriage. The objection to them seems to be religious and cultural ones. My personal belief, without any fact to support me other than my own impression of the candidates, is that they are all lying to us, and possibly, just possibly, to themselves about their true position. I just don’t believe that any of them really cares if two men or two women call their relationship a marriage. It goes against the general tenor of their beliefs. However, they all have probably heard from advisors that backing the very unpopular gay marriage would be a big mistake polically. McCain has the worst problem as his many in his own party doubt him on social values.
McCain was a life long Episcopalian. However, that church has begun to support the idea of gay marriage. Quietly, at some unknown point, McCain switched his church to that of the anti-gay marriage, Baptist church. Smoothly, quietly and under the radar. Now, of course, I cannot say for a certainty that there were not other factors. But one need not be more than the tiniest bit cynical to believe that his switch before a run for president to a church popular in the south that is known to be more anti-gay marriage (like the majority of Americans) was politically motivated, no matter what he tells himself or us.
A campaign based even in part on religion will bring out the worst in Americans. Because Obama is bi-racial (which I have come to belief is a political, not scientific term) race will also play a big roll in the campaign. I spent most of my life on relatively liberal Long Island. Yet, I know people there who have already openly determined not to vote for Obama just because he is black, or, heavens to Betsy, because it might make black people think “who they are” (sorry, but that is the expression I’ve heard – it seems to mean “think they are something special”).
I don’t want to say that I’ve heard many people say things like that as it has only been a few. But since I don’t talk to all that many people about politics, you can probably extrapolate it out to our voting population. It will add up to a lot of people.
I also know people who admit they will not vote for him because he has an Arabic name. Now, I listened to Jeremiah Wright speak and he said a lot of wacky things, but one thing he said that made sense I (and that was about it) was – “Arabic is a language, not a religion”. There are, as we know, some people who have no trouble juggling the ideas both that Obama is a Muslim (gasp) or a terrorist sympathizer, and, at the same time, a racist and intolerant Christian. We can safely assume that those people were not going to vote for Obama anyway unless he was running against Osama bin Laden.
Racism and religious mumbo jumbo on both sides of our political spectrum will not only rear its head, but like a hydra monster, grow two back for every one cut off. From watching the primaries, we know that many Obama’s supporters will challenge any criticism of him as racist, will use his ethnicity for their purposes, but cry “code words” or “hate speech” if McCain supporters mention it, and will insist that racism was the main reason if they lose (it might be one reason). We also know that McCain’s supporters will play up Obama’s Arabic name and his relationship with Wright and Pfleger, prey upon white people’s fears of a black president and suggest, or actually say, that he will have too much sympathy for America’s enemies, if not be an outright Manchurian candidate.
They both know better, say they want something different. Sadly, they have already started unfairly attacking each other and it will just get worse. Whoever wins (and I still believe it will be McCain) will end up tarnished by a large percentage of the population when he is sworn in. But, isn’t that the way if usually goes?
THE VP DECISION
There is rarely such hoopla about nothing than who will be the vice presidential nominees. If the popularity or good reputation of presidential candidates were important, then Mike Dukakis, who picked Lloyd Bentsen as his running mate, would have beaten George H. W. Bush, who chose Dan Quayle, a young running mate who was quickly turned into an iconic laughing stock by the media.
The media loves the guessing games. It takes months of air time where every barely employed pundit on the Beltway takes a few guesses. Some of their premises amuse. Often they try and pick someone who they think will help them win some small state even though they have learned time and time again that it doesn’t work. Sometimes they try and pick someone who brings something to the ticket that the candidate doesn’t have, like foreign policy experience or economic experience. Not only do voters generally not care, but everyone knows the president has many foreign policy and economic advisors and doesn’t need a vice president expert in either field. All that is important is that the VP candidate not be offensive to anyone who doesn’t already hate everyone not from their party, and be loyal. So, who cares? Only the media.
Resurrecting a past prediction, Mike Huckabee might be a good choice for McCain given his better conservative credentials. I use to think Duncan Hunter would be too, but his campaigning for president showed him too dour. There is the problem of evangelicals staying home on election day. However, for the sake of the independents both sides are fighting for, the Republicans don’t need two old white guys in the election of “change”. Still, McCain’s best choice would be Michael Steele of Maryland, the chairman of the RNC and a past candidate for Senator (he lost, but beat expectations). This intelligent and genial man also happens to be black, which would be a terrific antidote to those who want a minority to have a shot at a major post. Please don’t tell me that any candidate is above that.
Democrats have a tougher problem. Initially, I thought that Bill Richardson, accomplished and personable, would make a good VP selection. He thought so too, no doubt. However, he has now alienated the Clinton wing of the party and would present a ticket with two minorities. Probably not a good idea.
Who else? Sam Nunn’s name is being batted around. Has anyone asked him? A former senator from Georgia with loads of foreign affairs experience and respect from both sides of the aisle, he might be considered just too conservative by many Democrats (plus, he is almost as old as McCain). For me, his non-partisan ideology makes him desirable, but many people don’t look at it like that.
For similar reasons, Jim Webb of Virginia would probably make an excellent choice. Military man, former Reagan appointee, Southerner and reputation for toughness. He might do the trick.
GAS PROBLEMS
Get ready for fights at gas stations, gas lines at places selling discount (I’ve already waited ten minutes a month ago at a large supermarket chain gas station) and price gouging, always discovered too late, but inevitable.
What’s the answer? Everything. More drilling (hopefully with environmental care, but that is the risk we take for having a petroleum based society; we can always stop; no one wants to), conservation (isn’t that what you do personally?); a stronger dollar – the weakness in the dollar helps our exports but hurts with imports; investment in alternative energy - even enemies of nuclear energy now concede it may be the answer for the foreseeable future unless you are willing to pay $6 a gallon; reasonable supervision of energy companies forming cartels, or cornering the market, without insane overregulation of investors trying to make money by being smarter than other people.
Many chickens are coming home to roost, but not the chickens Jeremiah Wright was talking about. It is the belief in American “exceptionalism” in areas where we are just not exceptional, a feeling of entitlement on the part of many citizens to a level of luxury that is not reasonable or sustainable over the long turn, and refusal to sacrifice, address our culture of leisure, and lack of serious educational ambition by American parents, that will undo us. Gas prices are a symptom. In order to pull itself out of this funk, America either needs a true cultural change and probably much upheaval.
CABLE NEWS
Well, I almost give up. I used to watch CNN years ago, but it just got so boring. Then I watched Fox until I just couldn’t take the partisanship anymore. Switching to MSNBC, I was delighted that they actually seemed to balance the ideology. However, since the rise of uber-liberals, Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow, it is getting more like talk radio all the time (her real job). Add Chris Matthews, another interesting guy, but who is so anti-Clinton, he can’t see his own bias. Moreover, his beating up of his guests with glee isn’t interesting or fun. It’s painful to watch. And then he replays it over and over.
All of them are talented (Olbermann and Maddow, for instance, can riff on Bush pretty much forever) but just so partisan that I have the same lack of patience for them that I do with Rush Limbaugh. Fun for a little while and then . . . oh, come on.
This mixture of ideologies has created a lot of tension on screen. Chris Matthews had a meltdown with Joe Scarborough’s co-host, Mika Brzezinski, one morning (she annoys me sometimes too, but she was right -- it did seem he was endorsing Obama). Keith Olbermann supposedly refuses to do the lead-in to Dan Abrams’ show and Scarborough clearly despises Rachel Maddow, once doing a psycho-bolt off another show during a break after feuding with her. That sounds like it might be fun, but I find it embarrassing and awkward as they don't let you know how the conflict was resolved, if at all. I've even emailed MSNBC about it. No answer, obviously.
Moreover, the obvious desire to show respect for minorities has led to a bizarre situation where some hosts treat every idea by a black person, even patently ridiculous ones, seriously. The idea that minorities can't say something idiotic is its own type of racism.
However, MSNBC still my favorite station. Ironically, the conservative ideologues on the station are so pleasant, and have so modified their rancor at most liberal ideas that they are interesting and charming. And there are still moderates on the station who make it bearable.
Still, there are good reasons to watch – Morning Joe Scarborough, who has morphed into a fun loving talk show host that createst the best three great hours on television every morning (although he is absent too often); Pat Buchanan - I know some Jews and liberals will never forgive him, but he is like your grandpa now, and still the sharpest debater and most knowledgeable guy on almost every show he is on; columnist Eugene Robinson is a frequent guest and usually a steady, reasonable voice; Chuck Todd -- the rising star; Tucker Carlson, now a guest (I still can’t believe they took a show away from the best prime time host on cable news, but he was too nice and reasonable); and the charmingly snarky Willie Geist, formerly the comic relief on Tucker and now Morning Joe, where they are expanding his role. I leave out some of the others (I imagine I've been disrespectul to Tim Russert, Andrea Mitchell, Mike Barnicle and others who neither inspire me to watch, nor upset me when I do -- sorry).
Post publication note - Editing this post this next morning, I must add one note. Gen. Wesley Clark's attack on John McCain as being untested for the military aspects of the presidency is just so ridiculous on so many levels, you just have to shake your head and wonder. Two, questions that he was, of course, not asked on the friendly shows he was on -- 1) Who is more prepared to be president from a military/foreign affairs point of view - John McCain or Barack Obama. 2) Which president have we had who had more military and/or foreign affairs experience since Eisenhower. Answer to 1 - Please. You can argue that Obama should still be president despite his lack of experience, which pails compared to McCain, but . . . . 2. Maybe George Bush I, and arguably Nixon, but that's it.
Monday, June 02, 2008
The Bare Necessities of Tao
Recently, a friend of mine commented that she has been reading the Tao Te Ching a/k/a Daodejing or Laozi (there are many different styles of transliteration from the Chinese – we’ll just call it Tao here for both the book and the philosophy).
I had read the book myself and some commentaries on it long ago, and had actually been re-reading it recently in the form of one of those tiny books you can get at a cash register. Hiking has been a recent pastime of mine and reading the Tao on the top of a mountaintop looking over a valley is pretty peaceful, even if it seems a little forced. Anyway, we exchanged some emails about it (how un-Taolike) and it inspired this post.
We are told the Tao was written somewhere between 600-300 B.C. by a Chinese archivist or historian, Lao Tzu (Lao Tze, Laozi, whatever). According to some legends, he was either a contemporary of or slightly proceeded in time the other most revered Chinese philosopher, Kong Fu Tzu (Kongfuzi), a/k/a Confucius, so named for the West by a 16th-17th century Italian missionary to China whose name I just plain forget, if I ever knew it. That's what Wikipedia and Google are for. I'm headed elsewhere with this.
The actual existence of Lao Tzu must be placed in a category with that of the Buddha, Homer and many other early religious or “historical” figures. Historians seem to be more accepting of Confucius’ existence than Lao Tzu, but there is reason to doubt he was real too.
I’ve written earlier about questions of Jesus’ existence and concluded that there is sufficient evidence existing relatively soon after his life to support a conclusion that he was a real person, but centuries went by from when we are told Lao Tzu and Confucius existed (Buddha and Homer too) until there was anything in writing about them, making any similar conclusion pretty much impossible.
A possible reason for doubting Lao Tzu’s existence is that his name means “old master,” which sounds somewhat legendary in nature. However, some scholars argue that the "The old master" was an honorary title or name and can’t be evidence against his having existed. That’s reasonable. Consider that the Indian leader, Gandhi, is still often referred to as Mahatma (“Great Soul”) instead of his real first name -- Mohandas.
As far as we know, Lao Tzu was first mentioned in writing in the Historical Records by Sima Qian. Sima's work is equivalent to Herodotus’ Histories in the western world, although many centuries latter. Regrettably, my copy of Sima’s work (I may be an idiot, but I have a pretty good library) is very truncated, and I was disappointed to having had to learn about his version of Lao Tzu from secondary sources. Safe to say, though, that Sima’s combining of several versions of Lao Tzu’s life has the air of legend about it and is not great evidence of his actual existence either.
Naturally, if one is interested in the philosophy (the religion came much later, is substantially different, and I'm not talking about it here), it matters not a bit whether Lao Tzu existed at all or was a name given to a body of scholars or a series of them over time. After all, as an example, would Jean Paul Sartre’s Being and Nothingness be any more or less readable if, in four centuries, his existence is called into question?
As for the philosophical doctrines of the Tao, they are quite simple. The fact that they are so uncomplicated is sort of the point. If you make it complicated, you have strayed from the Way, which is about less, not more.
You can pretty much absorb the drift of the Tao from watching the 70s tv show, Kung Fu (“What is cowardice but the body's wisdom of its weakness? What is bravery but the body's wisdom of its strength. The coward and the hero march together within every man. So to call one man 'coward' and another 'brave' merely serves to indicate the possibilities of their achieving the opposite." - Master Po) or even Bruce Lee movies (“The style of fighting without fighting” says Bruce, replying to a bully who asked what his style was in Enter the Dragon).
Here are the main principles of the Tao, which are demonstrated below in a very untao-like bullet fashion.
-The Tao is a way of life and may also be a spirit force
-Nothingness or non-action is good
-Quietness is good
-Nature is good
-Emptiness is good
-Lack of desire is good
-Moderation is good
-Humility is good
-Simplicity is good
-The opposites of all the above are not good
Here’s one example of the way the old master phrased his philosophy in his book:
Fame or integrity: which is more important?
Money or happiness: which is more valuable?
Success of failure: which is more destructive?
If you look to others for fulfillment,
you will never truly be fulfilled.
If your happiness depends on money,
you will never be happy with yourself.
Be content with what you have;
rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing lacking,
the whole world belongs to you.
Once you read a few of these, you could start producing them yourself. And quite possibly, that is what happened, a number of philosophers producing them over the years until they were collected and canonized, not unlike what probably happened with the Bible (both) and Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.
There is really nothing in the Tao that is unique, of course. It sounds like many other philosophies, including Buddhism, which may have been highly influenced by Lao Tzu’s philosophy when it came to China (remember, Buddhism, founded in India, is rather rare there, but quite popular in other Asian countries like China and the surrounding countries).
I can’t help but notice that many writers and philosophers who have attracted my admiration during my near half century sound to some degree like Lao-Tzu adherents. We’ll finish up with some of them:
Diogenes: Hard to say what this Golden Age Greek’s philosophy was exactly because he left no body of work. We only know of him from other writers. According to all reports, Diogenes eschewed material goods and lived as close as possible to a natural state, even admiring dogs for their simple and unpretentious lives to the point of relieving himself and doing other things in public that I’m even too embarrassed to mention in print.
It is believed by some that his admiration for the lifestyle of dogs was the source of his nickname, dog or dog face. This was actually a metaphor in ancient Greece for shamelessness, which might fairly describe the philosophy. But it also may stem from something more mundane -- the name of his mentor’s academy. In any event, from this name, and Diogenes’ doubting philosophy, we get the modern word cynic. In fact, his philosophy and that of his mentor, Antisthenes, supposedly a companion of Socrates, is called cynicism, the root of which is the Greek word for dog (not to mention our "canine").
One story about Diogenes has him replying to the definition Plato put forth that man could be defines as a featherless biped. Diogenes brought a plucked chicken to Plato’s Academy and said - here is your man. Apparently, Plato added “with broad flat nails” to the definition, but I think he missed the point. Diogenes was also known for carrying a lantern about with him and to reply to inquirers who asked what he was doing that he was looking for an honest man.
Another anecdote has him visited by Alexander the Great, by some accounts the only man in Greece more famous at the time than the strange philosopher. The mighty Alexander asked Diogenes what he could do for him. He replied that Alexander could “stand out of his light.” Alexander must not have been offended as he reputedly said that he were he to be anyone but himself, he would want to be Diogenes. Not a bad complimement from a guy who conquered much of the known world.
Unlike Alexander, I wouldn’t want to be Diogenes. For one thing, I don’t like doing anything private in public. I could be wrong though. He was supposedly a lecturer and author, without any other duties, even after being captured by pirates and sold into slavery. That doesn’t sound like a bad life, particularly if you don’t have to make your bed (he slept, it is said, in a tub and threw away his begging bowl after seeing a peasant drink from his hands).
Epicurus: Another Greek philosopher who came slightly after Diogenes in time, and who is often misunderstood because he is called a hedonist, commonly thought of as someone who is obsessed with physical pleasure. That would be an exaggeration of Epicurus. He believed in training oneself to avoid pain, desire and fear and to seek mild or moderate pleasure – not excessive pleasure as with the modern meaning of hedonist. I believe Lao Tzu would have approved of his philosophy had he known him. It is actually possible that the Tao te Ching was not written until around Epicurus’ time, but cross pollination of ideas between China and Greece was not likely at that time.
A number of Tao-like sayings are attributed to Epicurus, two of which it will suffice to give you here:
Death is nothing to us; for that which has been dissolved into its elements experiences no sensations, and that which has no sensation is nothing to us;
A free life cannot acquire many possessions, because this is not easy to do without servility to mobs or monarchs.
Thoreau: We have to skip a bunch of centuries to get to this nineteenth century New England intellectual. In a way, he reminds us of modern day Diogenes without the indecent behavior but still challenging our need for modern technology. His brief sojourn on the shore of Walden Pond was made timeless by him in a little book that begins with the economics of his own vegetable garden. It is worth grinding through it to get to the brilliant aphorisms studding his work like diamonds in the ground.
Unfortunately, for us, he died young and left us not much more prose than Walden, his private journal and some essays and speeches like Civil Disobedience, which has inspired many later heroes like Martin Luther King and Gandhi. As with Lao Tzu, Thoreau either had a profound impression on my life, or, his writing seemed to validate my already existing personal philosophies. I can no longer remember for sure which came first.
I intend to write more about Thoreau someday, so will only give only two bites from his work here, the second of which should be quite familiar to you:
In the streets and in society I am almost invariably cheap and dissipated, my life is unspeakably mean. No amount of gold or respectability would in the least redeem it,-- dining with the Governor or a member of Congress!! But alone in the distant woods or fields, in unpretending sprout-lands or pastures tracked by rabbits, even in a bleak and, to most, cheerless day, like this, when a villager would be thinking of his inn, I come to myself . . . .
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
Although researchers say that there is no indication that Thoreau ever read the Tao, similarities have been noted on both sides of the ocean. Lin Yutang, a writer who translated Chinese classics into English wrote that Thoreau was the most Chinese of American writers and that he could have translated Thoreau into Chinese and easily passed him off as a native philosopher.
Rudyard Kipling: I mostly refer here just to his poem, If, not his other writings, although many of them still meet the test of time. If has been quoted in this blog before. I am so in love with it though, as an unachievable but but splendid model of behavior, that I don’t mind giving it here again, just as I have also recently sent it to my own daughter:
If
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!
I have no doubt that had Lao Tzu read these words, he would have taught it to his disciples. In fact, I just took a quick spin on the internet to seek out the text the easy way, and see that I am far from the first to notice the connection between the Englishman’s poem and the Asian philosophy. I was going to end the post with Kipling’s words, because it is not within my abilities to improve upon it with any length of prosaic commentary, but I thought of one more example, a little more modern.
At some point these days all great persons and ideas end up being expressed in a Disney song. Ironically, the lyrics to this song (which I slightly truncated), The Bare Necessities, was sung by the jovial Phil Harris in the animated version of another Kipling work – Jungle Book, one of my favorite novels.
You’ve probably heard Baloo the Bear sing about his philosophy of life at some point in your life (download it if you haven’t), but you probably haven't thought about it in terms of the Tao, as I ask you to do now:
Look for the bare necessities
The simple bare necessities
Forget about your worries and your strife
I mean the bare necessities
Old Mother Nature's recipes
That brings the bare necessities of life
Wherever I wander, wherever I roam
I couldn't be fonder of my big home
The bees are buzzin' in the tree
To make some honey just for me
When you look under the rocks and plants
And take a glance at the fancy ants
Then maybe try a few
The bare necessities of life will come to you
They'll come to you!
Look for the bare necessities
The simple bare necessities
Forget about your worries and your strife
I mean the bare necessities
That's why a bear can rest at ease
With just the bare necessities of life
. . .
So just try and relax, yeah cool it
Fall apart in my backyard
'Cause let me tell you something little britches
If you act like that bee acts, uh uh
You're working too hard
And don't spend your time lookin' around
For something you want that can't be found
When you find out you can live without it
And go along not thinkin' about it
I'll tell you something true
The bare necessities of life will come to you
Finding the Tao interesting or inspiring doesn't mean I hold myself up to any high standard of behavior. I might want a simpler life than many other people, but, I sure like modern plumbing and refrigeration, and wouldn't want to do without them. Then again, I know that Thoreau could not live up to his philosophy all the time and in all ways and I am fairly positive none of the others I talked about earlier did so either. If it were easy, everyone would do it. For all we know, Lao Tzu had the first ancient erotica collection and Diogenes tripped little old ladies who were standing in his light.
The Tao, in fact, is not congruent with earning a living in the modern age, and, thus, at best, virtually all but the very rarest of the rare, will have to moderate their seeking of the Way in order to get a 401K and health benefits. It is good to remember that the Way is best likened to a road, not a destination, and we may enter and exit it as life permits.
On thing I did learn about the Tao -- if you are trying too hard to understand it, you aren't doing it. Who really wants to be enlightened anyway?
I had read the book myself and some commentaries on it long ago, and had actually been re-reading it recently in the form of one of those tiny books you can get at a cash register. Hiking has been a recent pastime of mine and reading the Tao on the top of a mountaintop looking over a valley is pretty peaceful, even if it seems a little forced. Anyway, we exchanged some emails about it (how un-Taolike) and it inspired this post.
We are told the Tao was written somewhere between 600-300 B.C. by a Chinese archivist or historian, Lao Tzu (Lao Tze, Laozi, whatever). According to some legends, he was either a contemporary of or slightly proceeded in time the other most revered Chinese philosopher, Kong Fu Tzu (Kongfuzi), a/k/a Confucius, so named for the West by a 16th-17th century Italian missionary to China whose name I just plain forget, if I ever knew it. That's what Wikipedia and Google are for. I'm headed elsewhere with this.
The actual existence of Lao Tzu must be placed in a category with that of the Buddha, Homer and many other early religious or “historical” figures. Historians seem to be more accepting of Confucius’ existence than Lao Tzu, but there is reason to doubt he was real too.
I’ve written earlier about questions of Jesus’ existence and concluded that there is sufficient evidence existing relatively soon after his life to support a conclusion that he was a real person, but centuries went by from when we are told Lao Tzu and Confucius existed (Buddha and Homer too) until there was anything in writing about them, making any similar conclusion pretty much impossible.
A possible reason for doubting Lao Tzu’s existence is that his name means “old master,” which sounds somewhat legendary in nature. However, some scholars argue that the "The old master" was an honorary title or name and can’t be evidence against his having existed. That’s reasonable. Consider that the Indian leader, Gandhi, is still often referred to as Mahatma (“Great Soul”) instead of his real first name -- Mohandas.
As far as we know, Lao Tzu was first mentioned in writing in the Historical Records by Sima Qian. Sima's work is equivalent to Herodotus’ Histories in the western world, although many centuries latter. Regrettably, my copy of Sima’s work (I may be an idiot, but I have a pretty good library) is very truncated, and I was disappointed to having had to learn about his version of Lao Tzu from secondary sources. Safe to say, though, that Sima’s combining of several versions of Lao Tzu’s life has the air of legend about it and is not great evidence of his actual existence either.
Naturally, if one is interested in the philosophy (the religion came much later, is substantially different, and I'm not talking about it here), it matters not a bit whether Lao Tzu existed at all or was a name given to a body of scholars or a series of them over time. After all, as an example, would Jean Paul Sartre’s Being and Nothingness be any more or less readable if, in four centuries, his existence is called into question?
As for the philosophical doctrines of the Tao, they are quite simple. The fact that they are so uncomplicated is sort of the point. If you make it complicated, you have strayed from the Way, which is about less, not more.
You can pretty much absorb the drift of the Tao from watching the 70s tv show, Kung Fu (“What is cowardice but the body's wisdom of its weakness? What is bravery but the body's wisdom of its strength. The coward and the hero march together within every man. So to call one man 'coward' and another 'brave' merely serves to indicate the possibilities of their achieving the opposite." - Master Po) or even Bruce Lee movies (“The style of fighting without fighting” says Bruce, replying to a bully who asked what his style was in Enter the Dragon).
Here are the main principles of the Tao, which are demonstrated below in a very untao-like bullet fashion.
-The Tao is a way of life and may also be a spirit force
-Nothingness or non-action is good
-Quietness is good
-Nature is good
-Emptiness is good
-Lack of desire is good
-Moderation is good
-Humility is good
-Simplicity is good
-The opposites of all the above are not good
Here’s one example of the way the old master phrased his philosophy in his book:
Fame or integrity: which is more important?
Money or happiness: which is more valuable?
Success of failure: which is more destructive?
If you look to others for fulfillment,
you will never truly be fulfilled.
If your happiness depends on money,
you will never be happy with yourself.
Be content with what you have;
rejoice in the way things are.
When you realize there is nothing lacking,
the whole world belongs to you.
Once you read a few of these, you could start producing them yourself. And quite possibly, that is what happened, a number of philosophers producing them over the years until they were collected and canonized, not unlike what probably happened with the Bible (both) and Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey.
There is really nothing in the Tao that is unique, of course. It sounds like many other philosophies, including Buddhism, which may have been highly influenced by Lao Tzu’s philosophy when it came to China (remember, Buddhism, founded in India, is rather rare there, but quite popular in other Asian countries like China and the surrounding countries).
I can’t help but notice that many writers and philosophers who have attracted my admiration during my near half century sound to some degree like Lao-Tzu adherents. We’ll finish up with some of them:
Diogenes: Hard to say what this Golden Age Greek’s philosophy was exactly because he left no body of work. We only know of him from other writers. According to all reports, Diogenes eschewed material goods and lived as close as possible to a natural state, even admiring dogs for their simple and unpretentious lives to the point of relieving himself and doing other things in public that I’m even too embarrassed to mention in print.
It is believed by some that his admiration for the lifestyle of dogs was the source of his nickname, dog or dog face. This was actually a metaphor in ancient Greece for shamelessness, which might fairly describe the philosophy. But it also may stem from something more mundane -- the name of his mentor’s academy. In any event, from this name, and Diogenes’ doubting philosophy, we get the modern word cynic. In fact, his philosophy and that of his mentor, Antisthenes, supposedly a companion of Socrates, is called cynicism, the root of which is the Greek word for dog (not to mention our "canine").
One story about Diogenes has him replying to the definition Plato put forth that man could be defines as a featherless biped. Diogenes brought a plucked chicken to Plato’s Academy and said - here is your man. Apparently, Plato added “with broad flat nails” to the definition, but I think he missed the point. Diogenes was also known for carrying a lantern about with him and to reply to inquirers who asked what he was doing that he was looking for an honest man.
Another anecdote has him visited by Alexander the Great, by some accounts the only man in Greece more famous at the time than the strange philosopher. The mighty Alexander asked Diogenes what he could do for him. He replied that Alexander could “stand out of his light.” Alexander must not have been offended as he reputedly said that he were he to be anyone but himself, he would want to be Diogenes. Not a bad complimement from a guy who conquered much of the known world.
Unlike Alexander, I wouldn’t want to be Diogenes. For one thing, I don’t like doing anything private in public. I could be wrong though. He was supposedly a lecturer and author, without any other duties, even after being captured by pirates and sold into slavery. That doesn’t sound like a bad life, particularly if you don’t have to make your bed (he slept, it is said, in a tub and threw away his begging bowl after seeing a peasant drink from his hands).
Epicurus: Another Greek philosopher who came slightly after Diogenes in time, and who is often misunderstood because he is called a hedonist, commonly thought of as someone who is obsessed with physical pleasure. That would be an exaggeration of Epicurus. He believed in training oneself to avoid pain, desire and fear and to seek mild or moderate pleasure – not excessive pleasure as with the modern meaning of hedonist. I believe Lao Tzu would have approved of his philosophy had he known him. It is actually possible that the Tao te Ching was not written until around Epicurus’ time, but cross pollination of ideas between China and Greece was not likely at that time.
A number of Tao-like sayings are attributed to Epicurus, two of which it will suffice to give you here:
Death is nothing to us; for that which has been dissolved into its elements experiences no sensations, and that which has no sensation is nothing to us;
A free life cannot acquire many possessions, because this is not easy to do without servility to mobs or monarchs.
Thoreau: We have to skip a bunch of centuries to get to this nineteenth century New England intellectual. In a way, he reminds us of modern day Diogenes without the indecent behavior but still challenging our need for modern technology. His brief sojourn on the shore of Walden Pond was made timeless by him in a little book that begins with the economics of his own vegetable garden. It is worth grinding through it to get to the brilliant aphorisms studding his work like diamonds in the ground.
Unfortunately, for us, he died young and left us not much more prose than Walden, his private journal and some essays and speeches like Civil Disobedience, which has inspired many later heroes like Martin Luther King and Gandhi. As with Lao Tzu, Thoreau either had a profound impression on my life, or, his writing seemed to validate my already existing personal philosophies. I can no longer remember for sure which came first.
I intend to write more about Thoreau someday, so will only give only two bites from his work here, the second of which should be quite familiar to you:
In the streets and in society I am almost invariably cheap and dissipated, my life is unspeakably mean. No amount of gold or respectability would in the least redeem it,-- dining with the Governor or a member of Congress!! But alone in the distant woods or fields, in unpretending sprout-lands or pastures tracked by rabbits, even in a bleak and, to most, cheerless day, like this, when a villager would be thinking of his inn, I come to myself . . . .
If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer.
Although researchers say that there is no indication that Thoreau ever read the Tao, similarities have been noted on both sides of the ocean. Lin Yutang, a writer who translated Chinese classics into English wrote that Thoreau was the most Chinese of American writers and that he could have translated Thoreau into Chinese and easily passed him off as a native philosopher.
Rudyard Kipling: I mostly refer here just to his poem, If, not his other writings, although many of them still meet the test of time. If has been quoted in this blog before. I am so in love with it though, as an unachievable but but splendid model of behavior, that I don’t mind giving it here again, just as I have also recently sent it to my own daughter:
If
If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!
I have no doubt that had Lao Tzu read these words, he would have taught it to his disciples. In fact, I just took a quick spin on the internet to seek out the text the easy way, and see that I am far from the first to notice the connection between the Englishman’s poem and the Asian philosophy. I was going to end the post with Kipling’s words, because it is not within my abilities to improve upon it with any length of prosaic commentary, but I thought of one more example, a little more modern.
At some point these days all great persons and ideas end up being expressed in a Disney song. Ironically, the lyrics to this song (which I slightly truncated), The Bare Necessities, was sung by the jovial Phil Harris in the animated version of another Kipling work – Jungle Book, one of my favorite novels.
You’ve probably heard Baloo the Bear sing about his philosophy of life at some point in your life (download it if you haven’t), but you probably haven't thought about it in terms of the Tao, as I ask you to do now:
Look for the bare necessities
The simple bare necessities
Forget about your worries and your strife
I mean the bare necessities
Old Mother Nature's recipes
That brings the bare necessities of life
Wherever I wander, wherever I roam
I couldn't be fonder of my big home
The bees are buzzin' in the tree
To make some honey just for me
When you look under the rocks and plants
And take a glance at the fancy ants
Then maybe try a few
The bare necessities of life will come to you
They'll come to you!
Look for the bare necessities
The simple bare necessities
Forget about your worries and your strife
I mean the bare necessities
That's why a bear can rest at ease
With just the bare necessities of life
. . .
So just try and relax, yeah cool it
Fall apart in my backyard
'Cause let me tell you something little britches
If you act like that bee acts, uh uh
You're working too hard
And don't spend your time lookin' around
For something you want that can't be found
When you find out you can live without it
And go along not thinkin' about it
I'll tell you something true
The bare necessities of life will come to you
Finding the Tao interesting or inspiring doesn't mean I hold myself up to any high standard of behavior. I might want a simpler life than many other people, but, I sure like modern plumbing and refrigeration, and wouldn't want to do without them. Then again, I know that Thoreau could not live up to his philosophy all the time and in all ways and I am fairly positive none of the others I talked about earlier did so either. If it were easy, everyone would do it. For all we know, Lao Tzu had the first ancient erotica collection and Diogenes tripped little old ladies who were standing in his light.
The Tao, in fact, is not congruent with earning a living in the modern age, and, thus, at best, virtually all but the very rarest of the rare, will have to moderate their seeking of the Way in order to get a 401K and health benefits. It is good to remember that the Way is best likened to a road, not a destination, and we may enter and exit it as life permits.
On thing I did learn about the Tao -- if you are trying too hard to understand it, you aren't doing it. Who really wants to be enlightened anyway?
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
We demand (somewhat limited) free speech
Imagine it is 2004 and you read that Michael Moore was arrested for making Fahrenheit 9/11 or his comments about the Bush administration. Or, more topical, that Scott McClellan's recent book led to his arrest for maligning the administration during wartime or some such nonsense.
These suggestions seem improbable nowadays in our society. After all, we have free speech. Always have, always will, right? Possibly, first amendment rights are actually deemed by Americans to be the most important of all our rights (leaving aside those passionate gun advocates spurred on by the present partisan debate that feel the second amendment should be first).
It should be noted at first that there was, and sometimes still is, a debate as to whether it was necessary to have a bill of rights, including the first amendment, at all. Alexander Hamilton, for one, believed it would be counterproductive. These rights against the federal government were already in existence, he argued, as well as others. If some of them are set out in constitutional amendments, then the others might be deemed not to exist. He had a point, and it has been argued, successfully and unsuccessfully.
Literally, the first amendment reads as follows:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
This post deals with the second clause of that amendment, "abridging the freedom of speech," sometimes called freedom of expression.
The law on this subject is vast, and no attempt here will be made to do anything but just lightly touch upon some aspects of it it is hoped you might find interesting.
Just to simplify the arguments here, we will take "speech" to mean "expression," as it is commonly accepted (although I know one thick headed Montanan reader who might give me grief about it). Thus, accept for the sake of argument that pictures, writings, symbolic actions, etc., have at least some first amendment protection.
I am actually using the first amendment as an example to make a point that is actually a political heresy, possibly unique to myself. We are trained to say only worshipful things about the constitution and to give credit to the founders for their unworldly foresight. I would argue that it never worked in a myriad of ways. However, this is not an anti-patriotic or anti-constitutional scree. It merely reflects that the constitution was made by failable men who compromised in order to get the job done, and who had no crystal balls which would enable them to write for the ages.
Faced with text that just didn't work in many situations, judges, throughout the two hundred plus years of the country's history, have interpreted the constitution as they saw fit, sometimes reflecting the changing culture and sometimes leading it. While many argue that we need to stick to the meaning of the founders, or, for others, the intent of the founders, I do not believe that even the most assiduous of proponents of this view stick to it when the result would not please them. After all, Thomas Jefferson coined the phrase "strict construction" but derided such lack of flexibility as soon as he obtained the high office.
Even the godfather of modern originalism, Antonin Scalia of The Supreme Court of the
United States (and coincidentally the college roomate of my boss in my first law job), acknowledged at his Senate hearing that he understood, for example, that although lashing was not deemed to be cruel or unusual punishment to the framers, he would be happy to draw a line there and forbid it now. It is a fair question (which I would have asked, were I Senator [brief pause for laughter]) to ask if he was willing to draw a line where he thought necessary, how could he complain on principal when others draw different lines? Originalism, although a great theory, falls in upon itself the first time it is comprised.
Frankly, it is a good thing that the "freedom" of speech (or expression) is not taken literally. It would not satisfy any of us if we could say what we wanted but not write it or paint what we wished. The converse is true as well. Imagine a world where no expression could be infringed by the government. Perhaps that sounds great at first. Although in that world, no president could speak in public for the hecklers, no teacher could silence a student in order to teach, no police officer could stop verbal threats, no pornography could be banned in any environment including prime time television, no court, indeed, could carry on its mission if those who chose to speak determined to do so in court. And so on.
Because society could not function were total freedom of speech allowed and culturally seemed not to be able to bear certain other speech (obscenity - but has the internet made that law obsolete outside of child porn and public displays?) various devices were created by judges so that society could, in fact, infringe upon speech all the time. Yet, none of it is found in the constitution.
Despite the appearance of the amendment in 1791, when it definitely only applied to the federal government, it was not until the 1920s when it even began to have much effect and even to be applied to the states through a highly questionable series of judicial rulings that makes sense only if you disregard what the constitution says and just want the world to be a certain way.
Most famous historically speaking, is, of course, the alien-sedition act of the Adams administration which permitted some actual imprisonment of the press (freedom of the press is linked with speech in the first amendment) under limited circumstances.
The actual results of that act were not extreme, and it was was nothing compared to the federal government's actions during the first world war (I'll skip the Civil War -- but Lincoln's intolerance for free speech and press in wartime is well documented), when a many time socialist presidential candidate, Eugene Debs, was imprisoned for just making a speech during which he tried to be very careful about what he said, when an anti-war Senator, Robert LaFollette, was almost expelled from the Senate for his constitutionally protected words (he eventually shut up and survived) and, even crazier, when a movie maker, Robert Goldstein was actually imprisoned for 3 years (sentenced to 10) for making a film about the American Revolution, The Spirit of '76, in which, naturally, the Brits (our allies in WWI), were the bad guys. LaFollette had an eventual resurgence in his career, but Debs' and Goldstein's lives were destroyed. These are only examples. There were many others.
Although free speech has grown (thanks to judicial activity) the following are situations where the courts have allowed limited governmental infringement of speech despite the first amendment's supposed protection:
-pornography/obscenity
-speech at or near places of government activity
-hate speech/fighting words
-speech in school, both secondary and college
-speech that might disrupt the lives of private citizens (e.g., an injunction
prohibiting speech too close to an abortion clinic).
-private lawsuits against commercial speech (e.g., a suit against a magazine that
published an advertisement for a mercenary, leading to a murder)
-slander and libel
-fraud and deceptive advertising
-time, place and manner restrictions (when, where and how you may exercise your speech rights)
- political speech (e.g., the McCain-Feingold laws)
I would suggest that except for the first and last of that list, virtually everyone agrees (once they think about it) with these limitations. The reason for most of them is simple. As Justice Robert Jackson once wrote (I'm paraphrasing here, a lazy blogger's perogative) -- It's not a choice between liberty and order. It's about liberty with order. He is also sometimes credited with the thought that the constitution is not a suicide pact, although, like the first example, he merely restated the thought in his legal opinion. In other words, in real life, the first amendment (among other constitutional provisions) didn't work.
Similarly, Justice Learned Hand, a favorite of this blog, wrote (again paraphrasing)that without order, liberty becomes a license which would actually lead to the denial of liberty for those without the strength to enforce their will against stronger persons.
The fact that most of us like many of these limitations, although possibly to different degrees, is not surprising. It is also true, and becoming more true, that many people don't mind invasions of their privacy if it means a greater feeling of security. I have a somewhat different opinion about that issue though, which I will not go into here.
Still, the degree of these limitations are bitterly fought over and there will never be agreement on any of them. It keeps the courts busy. One problem is that very often in constitutional law, too much liberty for one person may bleed over into depriving the liberty of someone else. For example, if you tell someone they can't have organized prayer in school because it is unconstitutional, they might feel they are being deprived of their right to free exercise of their religion. If you tell someone they can have organized prayer in school, others feel that government is violating the prohibition on establishing religion.
You'll note, I hope, that the above limitations aren't, for the most part, about the content of the expression (again, excepting the first example and arguably the last one) and shouldn't be. Without freedom of content, at least in an alternate venue, the limitations would be intolerable, atleast to modern Americans, who have become used to it.
School free speech scenarios make good examples of the difficulty of deciding these cases. The Supreme Court ruled on one last year in Morse v. Frederick (aka, the Bong Hits for Jesus case).
Contrary to some reviews of it, no new law was made. The court applied what is known as the Tinker test, after another case, balancing the child's right to speech against the school's need for order so that it can fullfil its educational mission.
The court held that the school could prevent the student involved from holding up his "pro-drug" sign during a school event. Although Justice Clarence Thomas would have held that school kids have absolutely no free speech rights to begin with, that is certainly the minority position, and one I don't believe withstands close scrutiny.
I'm guessing, of course, but I think most Americans would agree with the court's decion in Morse v. Frederick case if they didn't know which judges voted which way (thereby ruling out partisan influences). But other similar cases are not so simple. Take a west coast federal case in which a student's tee shirt included, among other anti-gay material, writing saying "BE ASHAMED OUR SCHOOL EMBRACED WHAT GOD HAS CONDEMNED" worn after a pro-gay program in the school district was held.
The federal appeals' court upheld the school's punishment of the "offender," at least in part based on the notion that the message struck at gay students' "dignity and self-worth". Another judge actually wrote that it was ok to protect one student psyche from another student's speech based upon a misinterpretation of the bible. Hopefully, he will be the last judge to base an opinion on his biblical interpretation as opposed to an individual's own view.
The Supreme Court reversed the appeal's court's decision without issuing an explanatory opinion. Maybe they interpreted the Bible the same way the t-shirt wearer did. The important thing to ask yourself is if you were the judge, would your acceptance or rejection of gay marriage or "gay rights" would make a difference to you in coming to a decision.
Even more recently, just earlier this month, in fact, a federal appeals court in the middle of this country refused to allow a school to punish a student who wore a Be Happy, Not Gay t-shirt in response to pro-gay t-shirts that other students wore the day before on a school sponsored pro-gay day. Have the courts gotten the message. You can't stop students from wearing anti-gay t-shirts, particularly if there is pro-gay propagandizing in play. The two anti-gay t-shirt cases have been much discussed in legal circles in publications and online.
There are all kinds of permutations of this. Say a t-shirt reads George Bush Sucks, or, George Bush Rocks, depending on your prediliction, and the school has barred political material on shirts. Recently, an east coast federal court refused to permit a school to punish a student whose shirt mocked the president for being a "chickenhawk". Political speech often gets more protection than any other kind, but what if it were a more popular president and we were engaged in a war eliciting violent riots?
How about the rebel flag example? Can a student wear one on his shirt even if it upsets other students who believe it is meant to be a racist statement? How about if there is a Halloween party that day? How about if it is the first day the first black student starts in that school? How about if the flag has a cross in the corner? Or a picture of Robert E. Lee, who is practically a national hero at this point? How about if there are many types of rebel flags on the shirt in a collage (there actually were many different confederate flags)? How about if the words "Honor, Heritage and Equality" appear on the shirt underneath the flag? What if the wearer goes to school in a town where Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson both used to live and are still celebrated (Lexington, Virginia)?
We could go on in that fashion for quite a while, of course, but will give it a rest there. The point is, go ahead and keep telling yourself that the constitution works just fine without judicial tinkering. You'll be in good company, as almost everyone you know will almost certainly agree with you.
All I can do is disagree with you and hope that judges for the most part interpret cases in a way that makes me comfortable, because no constitution really can work without constant help and fiddling around with its meaning adjusted to the ever changing culture. There is always the danger that they will limit speech beyond our desire, of course, and then we might have to rely more on those self centered, cowardly representatives that we actually democratically elected to make decisions.
Even if we think in the abstract that judges shouldn't be making up law and even when we don't like the decisions, for the most part, be glad they do. Because whatever administration is in power, it is not likely to give a lot of thought to your liberty. And on the whole, we have much greater speech rights now thanks to judicial intervention than we did two hundred or a hundred years ago.
Dedication to democracy is crucial as is dedication to liberty; Both are impossible to perfect and the pursuit of each sometimes conflicts with the other, almost requiring some error by courts in making a decision. When there is friction between them, and the answer is not clear, put one finger, and one finger only on the scale for liberty.
I invite your voracious disagreement. It's a difficult subject and you might actually convince me I'm wrong.
These suggestions seem improbable nowadays in our society. After all, we have free speech. Always have, always will, right? Possibly, first amendment rights are actually deemed by Americans to be the most important of all our rights (leaving aside those passionate gun advocates spurred on by the present partisan debate that feel the second amendment should be first).
It should be noted at first that there was, and sometimes still is, a debate as to whether it was necessary to have a bill of rights, including the first amendment, at all. Alexander Hamilton, for one, believed it would be counterproductive. These rights against the federal government were already in existence, he argued, as well as others. If some of them are set out in constitutional amendments, then the others might be deemed not to exist. He had a point, and it has been argued, successfully and unsuccessfully.
Literally, the first amendment reads as follows:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
This post deals with the second clause of that amendment, "abridging the freedom of speech," sometimes called freedom of expression.
The law on this subject is vast, and no attempt here will be made to do anything but just lightly touch upon some aspects of it it is hoped you might find interesting.
Just to simplify the arguments here, we will take "speech" to mean "expression," as it is commonly accepted (although I know one thick headed Montanan reader who might give me grief about it). Thus, accept for the sake of argument that pictures, writings, symbolic actions, etc., have at least some first amendment protection.
I am actually using the first amendment as an example to make a point that is actually a political heresy, possibly unique to myself. We are trained to say only worshipful things about the constitution and to give credit to the founders for their unworldly foresight. I would argue that it never worked in a myriad of ways. However, this is not an anti-patriotic or anti-constitutional scree. It merely reflects that the constitution was made by failable men who compromised in order to get the job done, and who had no crystal balls which would enable them to write for the ages.
Faced with text that just didn't work in many situations, judges, throughout the two hundred plus years of the country's history, have interpreted the constitution as they saw fit, sometimes reflecting the changing culture and sometimes leading it. While many argue that we need to stick to the meaning of the founders, or, for others, the intent of the founders, I do not believe that even the most assiduous of proponents of this view stick to it when the result would not please them. After all, Thomas Jefferson coined the phrase "strict construction" but derided such lack of flexibility as soon as he obtained the high office.Even the godfather of modern originalism, Antonin Scalia of The Supreme Court of the
United States (and coincidentally the college roomate of my boss in my first law job), acknowledged at his Senate hearing that he understood, for example, that although lashing was not deemed to be cruel or unusual punishment to the framers, he would be happy to draw a line there and forbid it now. It is a fair question (which I would have asked, were I Senator [brief pause for laughter]) to ask if he was willing to draw a line where he thought necessary, how could he complain on principal when others draw different lines? Originalism, although a great theory, falls in upon itself the first time it is comprised.Frankly, it is a good thing that the "freedom" of speech (or expression) is not taken literally. It would not satisfy any of us if we could say what we wanted but not write it or paint what we wished. The converse is true as well. Imagine a world where no expression could be infringed by the government. Perhaps that sounds great at first. Although in that world, no president could speak in public for the hecklers, no teacher could silence a student in order to teach, no police officer could stop verbal threats, no pornography could be banned in any environment including prime time television, no court, indeed, could carry on its mission if those who chose to speak determined to do so in court. And so on.
Because society could not function were total freedom of speech allowed and culturally seemed not to be able to bear certain other speech (obscenity - but has the internet made that law obsolete outside of child porn and public displays?) various devices were created by judges so that society could, in fact, infringe upon speech all the time. Yet, none of it is found in the constitution.
Despite the appearance of the amendment in 1791, when it definitely only applied to the federal government, it was not until the 1920s when it even began to have much effect and even to be applied to the states through a highly questionable series of judicial rulings that makes sense only if you disregard what the constitution says and just want the world to be a certain way.
Most famous historically speaking, is, of course, the alien-sedition act of the Adams administration which permitted some actual imprisonment of the press (freedom of the press is linked with speech in the first amendment) under limited circumstances.
The actual results of that act were not extreme, and it was was nothing compared to the federal government's actions during the first world war (I'll skip the Civil War -- but Lincoln's intolerance for free speech and press in wartime is well documented), when a many time socialist presidential candidate, Eugene Debs, was imprisoned for just making a speech during which he tried to be very careful about what he said, when an anti-war Senator, Robert LaFollette, was almost expelled from the Senate for his constitutionally protected words (he eventually shut up and survived) and, even crazier, when a movie maker, Robert Goldstein was actually imprisoned for 3 years (sentenced to 10) for making a film about the American Revolution, The Spirit of '76, in which, naturally, the Brits (our allies in WWI), were the bad guys. LaFollette had an eventual resurgence in his career, but Debs' and Goldstein's lives were destroyed. These are only examples. There were many others.
Although free speech has grown (thanks to judicial activity) the following are situations where the courts have allowed limited governmental infringement of speech despite the first amendment's supposed protection:
-pornography/obscenity
-speech at or near places of government activity
-hate speech/fighting words
-speech in school, both secondary and college
-speech that might disrupt the lives of private citizens (e.g., an injunction
prohibiting speech too close to an abortion clinic).
-private lawsuits against commercial speech (e.g., a suit against a magazine that
published an advertisement for a mercenary, leading to a murder)
-slander and libel
-fraud and deceptive advertising
-time, place and manner restrictions (when, where and how you may exercise your speech rights)
- political speech (e.g., the McCain-Feingold laws)
I would suggest that except for the first and last of that list, virtually everyone agrees (once they think about it) with these limitations. The reason for most of them is simple. As Justice Robert Jackson once wrote (I'm paraphrasing here, a lazy blogger's perogative) -- It's not a choice between liberty and order. It's about liberty with order. He is also sometimes credited with the thought that the constitution is not a suicide pact, although, like the first example, he merely restated the thought in his legal opinion. In other words, in real life, the first amendment (among other constitutional provisions) didn't work.
Similarly, Justice Learned Hand, a favorite of this blog, wrote (again paraphrasing)that without order, liberty becomes a license which would actually lead to the denial of liberty for those without the strength to enforce their will against stronger persons.
The fact that most of us like many of these limitations, although possibly to different degrees, is not surprising. It is also true, and becoming more true, that many people don't mind invasions of their privacy if it means a greater feeling of security. I have a somewhat different opinion about that issue though, which I will not go into here.
Still, the degree of these limitations are bitterly fought over and there will never be agreement on any of them. It keeps the courts busy. One problem is that very often in constitutional law, too much liberty for one person may bleed over into depriving the liberty of someone else. For example, if you tell someone they can't have organized prayer in school because it is unconstitutional, they might feel they are being deprived of their right to free exercise of their religion. If you tell someone they can have organized prayer in school, others feel that government is violating the prohibition on establishing religion.
You'll note, I hope, that the above limitations aren't, for the most part, about the content of the expression (again, excepting the first example and arguably the last one) and shouldn't be. Without freedom of content, at least in an alternate venue, the limitations would be intolerable, atleast to modern Americans, who have become used to it.
School free speech scenarios make good examples of the difficulty of deciding these cases. The Supreme Court ruled on one last year in Morse v. Frederick (aka, the Bong Hits for Jesus case).
Contrary to some reviews of it, no new law was made. The court applied what is known as the Tinker test, after another case, balancing the child's right to speech against the school's need for order so that it can fullfil its educational mission. The court held that the school could prevent the student involved from holding up his "pro-drug" sign during a school event. Although Justice Clarence Thomas would have held that school kids have absolutely no free speech rights to begin with, that is certainly the minority position, and one I don't believe withstands close scrutiny.
I'm guessing, of course, but I think most Americans would agree with the court's decion in Morse v. Frederick case if they didn't know which judges voted which way (thereby ruling out partisan influences). But other similar cases are not so simple. Take a west coast federal case in which a student's tee shirt included, among other anti-gay material, writing saying "BE ASHAMED OUR SCHOOL EMBRACED WHAT GOD HAS CONDEMNED" worn after a pro-gay program in the school district was held.
The federal appeals' court upheld the school's punishment of the "offender," at least in part based on the notion that the message struck at gay students' "dignity and self-worth". Another judge actually wrote that it was ok to protect one student psyche from another student's speech based upon a misinterpretation of the bible. Hopefully, he will be the last judge to base an opinion on his biblical interpretation as opposed to an individual's own view.
The Supreme Court reversed the appeal's court's decision without issuing an explanatory opinion. Maybe they interpreted the Bible the same way the t-shirt wearer did. The important thing to ask yourself is if you were the judge, would your acceptance or rejection of gay marriage or "gay rights" would make a difference to you in coming to a decision.
Even more recently, just earlier this month, in fact, a federal appeals court in the middle of this country refused to allow a school to punish a student who wore a Be Happy, Not Gay t-shirt in response to pro-gay t-shirts that other students wore the day before on a school sponsored pro-gay day. Have the courts gotten the message. You can't stop students from wearing anti-gay t-shirts, particularly if there is pro-gay propagandizing in play. The two anti-gay t-shirt cases have been much discussed in legal circles in publications and online.
There are all kinds of permutations of this. Say a t-shirt reads George Bush Sucks, or, George Bush Rocks, depending on your prediliction, and the school has barred political material on shirts. Recently, an east coast federal court refused to permit a school to punish a student whose shirt mocked the president for being a "chickenhawk". Political speech often gets more protection than any other kind, but what if it were a more popular president and we were engaged in a war eliciting violent riots?
How about the rebel flag example? Can a student wear one on his shirt even if it upsets other students who believe it is meant to be a racist statement? How about if there is a Halloween party that day? How about if it is the first day the first black student starts in that school? How about if the flag has a cross in the corner? Or a picture of Robert E. Lee, who is practically a national hero at this point? How about if there are many types of rebel flags on the shirt in a collage (there actually were many different confederate flags)? How about if the words "Honor, Heritage and Equality" appear on the shirt underneath the flag? What if the wearer goes to school in a town where Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson both used to live and are still celebrated (Lexington, Virginia)?
We could go on in that fashion for quite a while, of course, but will give it a rest there. The point is, go ahead and keep telling yourself that the constitution works just fine without judicial tinkering. You'll be in good company, as almost everyone you know will almost certainly agree with you.
All I can do is disagree with you and hope that judges for the most part interpret cases in a way that makes me comfortable, because no constitution really can work without constant help and fiddling around with its meaning adjusted to the ever changing culture. There is always the danger that they will limit speech beyond our desire, of course, and then we might have to rely more on those self centered, cowardly representatives that we actually democratically elected to make decisions.
Even if we think in the abstract that judges shouldn't be making up law and even when we don't like the decisions, for the most part, be glad they do. Because whatever administration is in power, it is not likely to give a lot of thought to your liberty. And on the whole, we have much greater speech rights now thanks to judicial intervention than we did two hundred or a hundred years ago.
Dedication to democracy is crucial as is dedication to liberty; Both are impossible to perfect and the pursuit of each sometimes conflicts with the other, almost requiring some error by courts in making a decision. When there is friction between them, and the answer is not clear, put one finger, and one finger only on the scale for liberty.
I invite your voracious disagreement. It's a difficult subject and you might actually convince me I'm wrong.
Saturday, May 24, 2008
Political update for May, 2008 - Let the absurdities begin!
But they are funny
Love politics for the hypocrisy. If we don't, the constant torrent of it from the candidates, their supporters and the media will drive us crazy.
This post will continue to be anti-partisan, anti-Democrat, anti-Republican, anti-Liberal and anti-Conservative. Not that each of these groups do not have some sound ideas and claims, but their opposition to each others ideas, and single mindedness about their claims to having all the logical thoughts, the purest ideals and the most superior morals is just so much unadulterated nonsense, that even the reasonable notions are drowned out by all of the sound and fury, signifying . . . . (query for the audience -- do you need to reference an obvious quotation like that, or, can you reasonable rely on the intelligence of the readers? I say yes).
The latest round of flummery (a great word Rex Stout puts in his detective hero, Nero Wolfe's mouth) dominating the headlines are beauties like the transformance of Clinton's noting of a historical event (Robert Kennedy's assassination) into a slap at the apparently royal Kennedy clan when their eldest has just gotten a death sentence from cancer, and, because why not got to the extreme, a veiled threat as to what might happen to Obama if he wins. A pat on the back to Robert Kennedy, Jr. for quickly noting the silliness of the charges.
Obama was himself the subject of partisan buffoonery when he accidentally referred to the 57 United States. Rush Limbaugh implied that he may have been been thinking of his true constituency,the 57 Muslim nations. Oh, brother. Which is he Rush? A racist Christian or a clandestine Muslim? Because partisanship makes people illogical, there are those who actually have no trouble holding both of those beliefs.
But, to be absolutely fair to Obama, he said he had already campaigned in 57 states and had one to go, meaning he knew there were actually . . . 58 states. He must have been estimating.
Not for nothing, but McCain too suffered from one of these non-story stories when he accidentally mixed up Shia's and Sunni's and Al-Qaeda and Iranians on recent occasions. You know what it means -- nothing. Certainly nothing more than the fact that when you talk a real lot, every once in a while you are going to say something really stupid. I blather a lot about history and politics and every once in a while catch myself saying something that a moment's reflection would tell me I know better. Not to mention those mistakes this blog's Gotcha Gang (I purloined that name from the wise and wonderful William Safire and promise not to use it again) catches me on. Imagine the stupid stuff we say that we don't catch.
Not to pick on Obama, but his factual mistakes have been the most Dan Quaylish of the three. And, they are funny. McCain's just don't compare and Clinton's mistakes tend to come from having her being a little heavy to dance with (an expression I learned from an English pilot in Denmark) and due to the over-sensitivity of our current culture. Here are Obama's best, or is it worst (excluding the one about the 58 states):
- His parents got together because of the events at Selma, Alabama during the civil rights struggle. Unfortunately, he was born a couple of years before Selma. It is, of course, possible in a scenario suggested by a few highly accurate movies, that his parents met at Selma, realized their son would run for president, traveled back in time . . . .
- 10,000 people died from the tornadoes in Kansas this year. Well, to be fair 12 times 833 almost equals ten thousand and you would do that because -- quick look over there -- it's Brangelina.
- Suggesting that Clinton did better than he did in Kentucky because of the proximity of it to Arkansas, where she is well known. Huh? Now, how did he forget that the good people of Illinois, who elected him Senator, actually live next door to Kentucky, as opposed to Arkansas, which isn't (although not far).
- That we could be using the translators we now have in Iraq in Afghanistan if we had left. Problem is, the people in those two countries speak different languages. I guess he hasn't read the papers in a few years. So, just what does his being a former president of The Harvard Law Review really tell us about his education?
To drop out or not to drop out
Leaving gaffes for strategy, I am still perplexed by the debate over whether Clinton should get out. There is a very fair argument that her dropping out would benefit the Democrat party. But, since when have candidates put the party above their personal ambitions? And, really, why should they if they believe that they are best thing for their party (and you know they do)? Politics is a little like capitalism. People have to have some self interest in their hearts to do it. Leaving aside a couple of secular saints, why else would they go through that hell?
Arguably, the Democrats would also have been better off if Obama dropped out when Clinton was in the lead, avoiding a bit of unpleasantness (exaggerated, in my humble opinion) and the whole Reverend Wright thingee (which I feel certain will make a difference in the general election). There is the difference, of course, that it is virtually impossible for her to win now absent some unforeseen political time bomb going off, and that wasn't true when she was leading.
A few pundits, not many, have had the wisdom to see that maybe all the fuss between them has driven John McCain out of the news, except when he says something stupid, and, it the continued race might actually be good for the Democrats. All the fussing of McCain and even Pat Buchanan in '00 did not stop Bush.
Global Warming
More and more I gear myself up to try and learn something about the global warming debate, but, I have the feeling that the topic has been too infected by partisan warriors to find much on it that is a fair examination. Frankly, I have little interest in a book or article that has come to a strong conclusion, because I do not know how this is possible given the limited information we seem to have.
Please feel free to write in and tell me that it is crystal clear that A) global warming is a fact (as well as man's contribution to it) or B) Global warming is no more than a bad dream Al Gore had, and that everyone knows it. It's not that partisans choose to refuse to believe only what those people they identify with politically have to say, they just do it without thinking. If people actually believe that disagreements on federalism and the construction of the constitution also have meaning when we discuss the weather, well, what are the limits, really?
Iraq
I've said this before probably, but need to emphasize it. When it comes to Iraq, I don't care whether Obama, Clinton or McCain are in office. The facts on the ground there, and the opinions of the chiefs of staff will dictate what the next president does, whether we go or stay, and how soon.
I do not believe that a Democratic president will allow chaos to reign in Iraq by removing too many troops too soon, nor do I believe a Republican one will allow us to drain our last drachmas down the Tigris River. At some point we will go, of course, except for a symbolic force. We may leave a relatively peaceful country or not, but we will go. After all, Lebanon is about to implode again and we can do nothing about it. Nor do we try much. (Self promotion flash - if you are interested in the Hezbollah-Israeli war fought a couple of Summers ago, take a look at the 10/25and 11/12 posts on the subject. I may not be right, but I think my slant on the unseen importance of that conflict is different than any one else's [and, by the way, I'm right]).
A personal indulgence
Permit me a little self indulgence here. While I'm busy self promoting (to what end? you may ask - I'm not selling coffee mugs with my picture on it?), I was looking at the archives of this post, and have to admit, felt a little pride there (don't get excited -- not that much). It started in September '06 and I had no idea whether I would continue to write it or not, but have done so roughly once a week since then. That is much longer than all but two relationships I've had and about half as long as my longest job. If I'm going to have a problem with committment, at least it does not seem to be with writing. And that is true even if they are all awful.
I have no idea of the size of my audience, but if it is more than ten people regularly (perhaps much less), I'll be surprised. I know I'm surprised when people I would not have guessed tell me they read it.
Looking back, I've written several times on Civil War stories, General James Longstreet, who hated whom among the forefathers, Winston Churchill, possibly the greatest runner in history (4/11/07), an American Olympian that will surprise you (not saying more -- 1/6/08), the worst vice presidents, Abraham Lincoln (about to fight a duel?, Lincoln the racist?), Abraham of the Bible (wait to you read this one), the Epic of Gilgamesh, the atomic bomb, the guy who invented radio and whose inventions allowed modern electrification (not who they taught you either -- 12/7/06), the ancient Greek language, famous people named Moses, George Chuvalo (a boxer, if you didn't know), abortion, evidence of early man (or lack thereof), the assassination of a world leader you never heard of (4/28/08), Bruce Lee, chimeras, who wrote Night Before Christmas (a personal favorite – 9/26/06), atheists and their spirituality, a scary opinion poll (my first post - 9/6/06), cell phones manners, the educational system, an Alexander Hamilton sex scandal and an Alexander Hamilton murder mystery, George Washington and civility, at least two attacks on Thomas Jefferson, the Nazi Invasion of Long Island, Louis Prima, the problem with predictions, quantum physics, the great writer/explorer, Richard Burton (no, not the actor), the planet Pluto, secrecy in war, the Santa Claus/Thor connection (another personal favorite –- 11/2/06), Superman and Hugo Chavez, Elliot Sptizer, Anna Nicole Smith (in case you thought tv lawyers are unrealistic), The Lord of the Rings, proof of Jesus' existence, the Supreme Court, bureaucracy, UFOs, inspirational readings, the second amendment, national security letters, a number of posts on various forgotten mountain men, movie trivia, political and geographic trivia, recurring posts on politics, and some desert island furbishing (purely aesthetic, I assure you). There is also one piece of fiction (3/6/07) and a bit on a lady friend (who does read this) who has a penchant for saying some unusual things (4/26/07) which always tickle me. I'm sure there are others I've forgotten.
One more small personal indulgence -- happy birthday to my great friend of almost 40 years (38, but whose counting) -- Bear, likely the most frequent visitor to this site, who weighs in regularly with either a bouquet of roses or a battering ram in the comment section, and who too infrequently posts himself at incorrect-bear.blogspot.com.
End of indulgences.
Love politics for the hypocrisy. If we don't, the constant torrent of it from the candidates, their supporters and the media will drive us crazy.
This post will continue to be anti-partisan, anti-Democrat, anti-Republican, anti-Liberal and anti-Conservative. Not that each of these groups do not have some sound ideas and claims, but their opposition to each others ideas, and single mindedness about their claims to having all the logical thoughts, the purest ideals and the most superior morals is just so much unadulterated nonsense, that even the reasonable notions are drowned out by all of the sound and fury, signifying . . . . (query for the audience -- do you need to reference an obvious quotation like that, or, can you reasonable rely on the intelligence of the readers? I say yes).
The latest round of flummery (a great word Rex Stout puts in his detective hero, Nero Wolfe's mouth) dominating the headlines are beauties like the transformance of Clinton's noting of a historical event (Robert Kennedy's assassination) into a slap at the apparently royal Kennedy clan when their eldest has just gotten a death sentence from cancer, and, because why not got to the extreme, a veiled threat as to what might happen to Obama if he wins. A pat on the back to Robert Kennedy, Jr. for quickly noting the silliness of the charges.
Obama was himself the subject of partisan buffoonery when he accidentally referred to the 57 United States. Rush Limbaugh implied that he may have been been thinking of his true constituency,the 57 Muslim nations. Oh, brother. Which is he Rush? A racist Christian or a clandestine Muslim? Because partisanship makes people illogical, there are those who actually have no trouble holding both of those beliefs.
But, to be absolutely fair to Obama, he said he had already campaigned in 57 states and had one to go, meaning he knew there were actually . . . 58 states. He must have been estimating.
Not for nothing, but McCain too suffered from one of these non-story stories when he accidentally mixed up Shia's and Sunni's and Al-Qaeda and Iranians on recent occasions. You know what it means -- nothing. Certainly nothing more than the fact that when you talk a real lot, every once in a while you are going to say something really stupid. I blather a lot about history and politics and every once in a while catch myself saying something that a moment's reflection would tell me I know better. Not to mention those mistakes this blog's Gotcha Gang (I purloined that name from the wise and wonderful William Safire and promise not to use it again) catches me on. Imagine the stupid stuff we say that we don't catch.
Not to pick on Obama, but his factual mistakes have been the most Dan Quaylish of the three. And, they are funny. McCain's just don't compare and Clinton's mistakes tend to come from having her being a little heavy to dance with (an expression I learned from an English pilot in Denmark) and due to the over-sensitivity of our current culture. Here are Obama's best, or is it worst (excluding the one about the 58 states):
- His parents got together because of the events at Selma, Alabama during the civil rights struggle. Unfortunately, he was born a couple of years before Selma. It is, of course, possible in a scenario suggested by a few highly accurate movies, that his parents met at Selma, realized their son would run for president, traveled back in time . . . .
- 10,000 people died from the tornadoes in Kansas this year. Well, to be fair 12 times 833 almost equals ten thousand and you would do that because -- quick look over there -- it's Brangelina.
- Suggesting that Clinton did better than he did in Kentucky because of the proximity of it to Arkansas, where she is well known. Huh? Now, how did he forget that the good people of Illinois, who elected him Senator, actually live next door to Kentucky, as opposed to Arkansas, which isn't (although not far).
- That we could be using the translators we now have in Iraq in Afghanistan if we had left. Problem is, the people in those two countries speak different languages. I guess he hasn't read the papers in a few years. So, just what does his being a former president of The Harvard Law Review really tell us about his education?
To drop out or not to drop out
Leaving gaffes for strategy, I am still perplexed by the debate over whether Clinton should get out. There is a very fair argument that her dropping out would benefit the Democrat party. But, since when have candidates put the party above their personal ambitions? And, really, why should they if they believe that they are best thing for their party (and you know they do)? Politics is a little like capitalism. People have to have some self interest in their hearts to do it. Leaving aside a couple of secular saints, why else would they go through that hell?
Arguably, the Democrats would also have been better off if Obama dropped out when Clinton was in the lead, avoiding a bit of unpleasantness (exaggerated, in my humble opinion) and the whole Reverend Wright thingee (which I feel certain will make a difference in the general election). There is the difference, of course, that it is virtually impossible for her to win now absent some unforeseen political time bomb going off, and that wasn't true when she was leading.
A few pundits, not many, have had the wisdom to see that maybe all the fuss between them has driven John McCain out of the news, except when he says something stupid, and, it the continued race might actually be good for the Democrats. All the fussing of McCain and even Pat Buchanan in '00 did not stop Bush.
Global Warming
More and more I gear myself up to try and learn something about the global warming debate, but, I have the feeling that the topic has been too infected by partisan warriors to find much on it that is a fair examination. Frankly, I have little interest in a book or article that has come to a strong conclusion, because I do not know how this is possible given the limited information we seem to have.
Please feel free to write in and tell me that it is crystal clear that A) global warming is a fact (as well as man's contribution to it) or B) Global warming is no more than a bad dream Al Gore had, and that everyone knows it. It's not that partisans choose to refuse to believe only what those people they identify with politically have to say, they just do it without thinking. If people actually believe that disagreements on federalism and the construction of the constitution also have meaning when we discuss the weather, well, what are the limits, really?
Iraq
I've said this before probably, but need to emphasize it. When it comes to Iraq, I don't care whether Obama, Clinton or McCain are in office. The facts on the ground there, and the opinions of the chiefs of staff will dictate what the next president does, whether we go or stay, and how soon.
I do not believe that a Democratic president will allow chaos to reign in Iraq by removing too many troops too soon, nor do I believe a Republican one will allow us to drain our last drachmas down the Tigris River. At some point we will go, of course, except for a symbolic force. We may leave a relatively peaceful country or not, but we will go. After all, Lebanon is about to implode again and we can do nothing about it. Nor do we try much. (Self promotion flash - if you are interested in the Hezbollah-Israeli war fought a couple of Summers ago, take a look at the 10/25and 11/12 posts on the subject. I may not be right, but I think my slant on the unseen importance of that conflict is different than any one else's [and, by the way, I'm right]).
A personal indulgence
Permit me a little self indulgence here. While I'm busy self promoting (to what end? you may ask - I'm not selling coffee mugs with my picture on it?), I was looking at the archives of this post, and have to admit, felt a little pride there (don't get excited -- not that much). It started in September '06 and I had no idea whether I would continue to write it or not, but have done so roughly once a week since then. That is much longer than all but two relationships I've had and about half as long as my longest job. If I'm going to have a problem with committment, at least it does not seem to be with writing. And that is true even if they are all awful.
I have no idea of the size of my audience, but if it is more than ten people regularly (perhaps much less), I'll be surprised. I know I'm surprised when people I would not have guessed tell me they read it.
Looking back, I've written several times on Civil War stories, General James Longstreet, who hated whom among the forefathers, Winston Churchill, possibly the greatest runner in history (4/11/07), an American Olympian that will surprise you (not saying more -- 1/6/08), the worst vice presidents, Abraham Lincoln (about to fight a duel?, Lincoln the racist?), Abraham of the Bible (wait to you read this one), the Epic of Gilgamesh, the atomic bomb, the guy who invented radio and whose inventions allowed modern electrification (not who they taught you either -- 12/7/06), the ancient Greek language, famous people named Moses, George Chuvalo (a boxer, if you didn't know), abortion, evidence of early man (or lack thereof), the assassination of a world leader you never heard of (4/28/08), Bruce Lee, chimeras, who wrote Night Before Christmas (a personal favorite – 9/26/06), atheists and their spirituality, a scary opinion poll (my first post - 9/6/06), cell phones manners, the educational system, an Alexander Hamilton sex scandal and an Alexander Hamilton murder mystery, George Washington and civility, at least two attacks on Thomas Jefferson, the Nazi Invasion of Long Island, Louis Prima, the problem with predictions, quantum physics, the great writer/explorer, Richard Burton (no, not the actor), the planet Pluto, secrecy in war, the Santa Claus/Thor connection (another personal favorite –- 11/2/06), Superman and Hugo Chavez, Elliot Sptizer, Anna Nicole Smith (in case you thought tv lawyers are unrealistic), The Lord of the Rings, proof of Jesus' existence, the Supreme Court, bureaucracy, UFOs, inspirational readings, the second amendment, national security letters, a number of posts on various forgotten mountain men, movie trivia, political and geographic trivia, recurring posts on politics, and some desert island furbishing (purely aesthetic, I assure you). There is also one piece of fiction (3/6/07) and a bit on a lady friend (who does read this) who has a penchant for saying some unusual things (4/26/07) which always tickle me. I'm sure there are others I've forgotten.
One more small personal indulgence -- happy birthday to my great friend of almost 40 years (38, but whose counting) -- Bear, likely the most frequent visitor to this site, who weighs in regularly with either a bouquet of roses or a battering ram in the comment section, and who too infrequently posts himself at incorrect-bear.blogspot.com.
End of indulgences.
Friday, May 16, 2008
Ladies and Gentleman: I give you Louis Prima
Fell down on the job, did I (my Yoda voice)? On December 10, 2007 I posted “Sing, Sing, Sing,” which essentially made the 
argument, even if I didn’t exactly say it, that Louis Prima’s Sing, Sing, Sing is the greatest instrumental piece of the 20th and 21st centuries. Although it is always iffy to write on anything subjective being the “best,” the arguments in favor of Prima’s masterpiece being exceptional, perhaps unique, are formidable (I’m not writing it all over again – please go look at the post).
I promised then, and promptly forgot, to write more on Prima. I’ll start with my personal opinion and take it from there. Prima is my favorite musician, bar none, ahead of Louis Armstrong, Richard Wagner, Peter Tchaikovsky, Bruce Springsteen and even Emerson, Lake & Palmer, the favorite group of my teenage years.
As with SSS’s pre-eminence, there are a host of supporting arguments why Prima should be counted at least in the top tier of twentieth century musicians, much more than say Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra and other obvious choices might deserve it. The Capitol Records Collection of Prima’s hits has been played by this little blogger literally hundreds of times, both in my car and at parties. Almost every recording on it is infectious, charming, pulsing and clever. Rarely have I played it for guests without exceedingly positive comment or inquiry about it.
Let’s be more controversial though. Prima should be in the most select of musical hall of fames celebrating 20th century musicians and singers along with Louis Armstrong, The Beatles, Sinatra, Chuck Berry and few others.
Of course, the first powerful argument why Prima should be in this stellar group is, of course, that he wrote (and played and recorded) SSS. That alone makes him an immortal. One of the central arguments of my post about that song was how many times it has been used in film to help set the mood for the swing error. Only a few months after that post was written, we could already add another film to the list – George Clooney’s Leathernecks used it even though SSS was written and recorded long after the time period signified in that movie (the 20s) and I have found a number of other films I didn’t include.
There are other arguments though. Prima’s musical versatility, his highly popular Vegas stage act, his virtuoso performances on the trumpet, the extraordinary length of his music’s popularity right up to today (even if no one knows it), his unique singing style and skat singing credentials, are all extraordinary.
Prima has been dead since 1978, but we are continually hearing his music. Rarely a month goes by when I don’t stop what I’m doing and point out to whomever I’m with that the song on a television or radio commercial is a Prima piece, possibly by Prima himself. Although I have searched for information on all the commercials his music has been featured on, I have come up empty, but it is an enormous amount.
Since Prima’s death, aside from new versions of SSS, two other of his trademark songs have been re-recorded and made into hits. Few seemed to know at the time that they were even remakes. (I know this, because I asked).
David Lee Roth’s hit Just a Gigolo/I ain't got nobody, a rollicking and fun recording from 1985 started the recent Prima band wagon going. I note that the Wikipedia article on Roth does not mention his indebtedness to Prima at all for ratcheting up his career. Still, I have to admit that Prima did not write Just a Gigolo or I ain't got nobody, or even first record them. It actually is an Austrian song, and was first adapted to English in the 1920s. Yet, for good reason, we can have no problem giving Prima credit for inspiring Roth and even an earlier version by The Village People from the 70s.
How can we do this? Because Prima did something unique with his 1945 and 1956 recordings (the second with Sam Butera arranging) and Roth and the Village People both copied it (though the Village People did each song separately). Roth’s recording bears the names of both songs, just like Prima's did.
Just as Goodman co-opted S, S, S, so Prima has co-opted Just a Gigolo. It is his so much, that words from it were put on his tombstone.
Roth wasn’t the last to successfully honor Prima (reportedly Sam Butera called Roth out on not giving him any money for his arrangement when Roth came to visit him). Brian Setzer’s Jump, Jive and Wail was a faithful copy of Prima’s swing classic, which had been largely forgotten by the populous. It was also picked up by The Gap clothing stores as the theme for a popular commercial if you are trying to place it. Written in ’39 by Prima, a few years after SSS, it actually won a Grammy award with Setzer’s performance SIXTY YEARS after Prima wrote and performed it and over forty years after Prima’s most famous recording of the song. That’s staying power.
Although winning a Grammy is hardly part of the recipe for musical greatness (Britney Spears has won), Prima actually won himself in 1959 for That Old Black Magic, a song he covered with such pizzazz that his version makes all others seem dull and listless in comparison.
In fact, although Prima did not write all his hit songs, when you listen to his covers and compare them with anyone else’s, including the much more famous Sinatra, it is like comparing a search light with a light bulb. There is one exception I can think of – both Prima and the combination of Danny Kaye and The Andrews Sisters released covers of Civilization: Bongo Bongo Bongo at about the same time in 1947, when it was a hit in a Broadway play, and the Kaye/Andrews version did slightly better. No excuses, theirs is better (and one of my favorite non-Prima pieces).
How many classics can you name by Bing Crosby (mostly holiday songs, which is almost unfair) or Glenn Miller (maybe two) or Benny Goodman (probably one, and Prima wrote it)? Prima has a long list of hits you can still hear on television shows, movies and commercials today that he was recording until a few years before he died. Think about it, he wrote SSS in his mid-twenties and Jump, Jive an’ Wail before he was 30, both in the 1930s. The first is still the classic swing song and the second again a recent Billboard hit. Leaving aside Christmas songs, for who else does this repeatedly happen?
When you hear Louis Prima, there is no mistaking him. His voice, his Italian ethnic/jazz mixture is entirely unique and personal to him. I doubt it could be duplicated well, although someone should right the Broadway musical (if I had any musical ability, I’d give it a shot). When he sings, and he can sing well, he doesn’t worry about staying with the beat, or laughing in the middle of a song. Although scat singing is by definition a style unique to each practitioner, Louis Prima’s scat is somehow more unique than others, if that makes any sense. Just for the hell of it, here are this blog’s list of the three greatest scat singers in history (and Ella Fitzgerald is not one of them).
Louis Armstrong
Louis Prima
Danny Kaye (I know, who would have thought, but download the recording of Kaye and Armstrong doing When the Saints Come Marching In and you will see what I mean).
Prima swerves back and forth between English and Italian effortlessly and sometimes seemingly chaotically. He clowns with his band and especially with Keely Smith, his fourth wife and partner on stage. Sometimes he will challenge a band member to mimic his voice with his instrument. It is well known, and Sonny has confirmed it, that the dour faced Cher to Sonny’s happy sprite is a Prima/Smith copy. Often the songs seem like one big improvisation, but it was all the product of endless rehearsal.
Other than Keely Smith, the best known of Prima’s compatriots is the aforementioned and great Sam Butera, an electrifying saxophonist, who, like Smith, is still alive and still playing. Sam and Louis kid around like they grew up together. I’m still waiting for him to come around someday so I can hear him live.
Prima started out with a small band, but then had to go the big band route like everyone else in the 30s. When big band faded he went back to a smaller band and headed for Las Vegas where he was one of the greatest acts ever to play the City of Lights. After that, he slowly started to move into rock n’ roll, even progressive rock, although these are not among the bands greatest work.
Late in his career, a few years before he slipped into a three year coma and died, Prima recorded
for Disney the voice of King Louie, an orangutan determined to get the secret of fire from Mowgli in Jungle Book. It is still being covered by other bands. For a while, the legendary Mitch Miller produced Prima in a series of novelty songs which are not among my favorites, although some are up to his usual standards.
Actually, before the animated Jungle Book, Prima was in a few movies himself, although these I have never, and will never likely, see. Although, if I did, it would be Hey, Boy! Hey, Girl!, if for nothing else, to see Louis and Keely perform the song.
Back in the Stone Age, I would just recommend you buy The Capitol Collectors Series: Louis Prima, but nowadays, you can just download the songs you like. Here’s my recommendation for the classic Prima download, many of them with, Keely Smith, although, if you want to buy a CD, that is still the one. Here’s the list:
- Sing, Sing, Sing (get both the Prima vocal version and the Goodman 1938 classic recording with Gene Krupa and other stars)
- I’m Just a Gigolo/I Ain’t Got Nobody
- Jump, Jive an' Wail
- Buena Sera (there are several great versions – all good. I’d get at least two at different tempos)
- St. Louis Blues (perhaps the first great Jazz song; like most Prima covers, he just does it better than everyone else; again, try to get two with different tempos)
- Angelina/Zooma-Zooma medley
- Brooklyn Boogie (a real instrumental oldie, but one that really boogies)
- I’ve Got the World on a String
- Hey, Boy! Hey, Girl!
- I’ve Got You Under My Skin
- The Lip (this is one of his novelty songs, and lots of fun)
- The Music Goes Round and Round
- Oh, Marie- Pennies From Heaven
- That Old Black Magic
- Twist All Night (early rock & roll from a jazz master born in 1910)
- When You’re Smiling/The Sheik of Araby medley
- I've Got You Under My Skin
- I Want to be Like You (the Disney classic)
Leave aside SSS, for which I have already tried to list every movie and tv show which played it that I could find in the 12/10/07 post (and have found more since), Among the many, many uses of Prima’s other works in film and television includes:
Mission: Impossible III (2006)(A Sunday Kind of Love)Find Me Guilty (2006) (When You're Smiling (The Whole World Smiles with You))Where the Truth Lies (2005) (Josephine, Please No Lean on the Bell)Kicking & Screaming (2005) (Zooma, Zooma)Elf (2003) (Pennies From Heaven)Anger Management (2003) (When You're Smiling)Mafia: Lost Heaven (2002) (Long About Midnight, Sing It 'Way Down Low’, I'm Living In A Great Big Way)Don't Say a Word (2001) (Fee Fie Foo)Liberty Heights (1999) (A Sunday Kind of Love)Mickey Blue Eyes (1999) (Just a Gigolo, Buena Sera Senorita)Swing (1999) (Five Months Two Weeks Two Days)Analyze This (1999) (Angelina/Zooma Zooma, When You're Smiling/The Sheik of Araby)City of Angels (1998) (Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop)Lolita (1997) (Civilization (Bongo Bongo Bongo)Big Night (1996) (Buona Sera, Oh Marie, Love of My Life (O Sole Mio), Five Months, Two Weeks, Two Days)Casino (1995) (Zooma Zooma, Zooma Zooma, Basin Street Blues/When It's Sleepy Time Down South, I'm Confessin' (That I Love You)Forget Paris (1995) (Lazy River)Cobb (1994) (That Old Black Magic)Mad Dog and Glory (1993) (That Old Black Magic, Just a Gigolo, I Ain't Got Nobody)Mystic Pizza (1988) (I Ain’t Got Nobody)The Man Called Flintstone (1966) (Pensate Amore)
This is just a small sample based on what shows or movies I would guess would be familiar to you. There are many, many more, and endless commercials.
When I write about someone on this post, it is almost always because I feel like they should be reverred and don't get enough ink. Prima was one of the all time greats, even if he is barely remembered today except by the older generation, despite the fact that his music is still recorded and used by others more than any almost anyone else (maybe I don't need the "almost" either). He started out and was successful in the dixieland era, through big bands, small stage bands and even some limited success in the rock era. Although Danny Thomas, the late comedian, is not exactly a musical authority, I'll go with his quote during the Las Vegas years about Louis Prima and the Witnesses (including Sam Butera): "Man for man, pound for pound, it is the greatest music organization in the world," although I could have went with Ed Sullivans "Greatest act in show business today".
Benny Goodman got the title "King of Swing" primarily for his great work on a Louis Prima song. If he's the king, the Prima should be emperor (Louis Armstrong fans, don't kill me. I know, I know -- can we call it a tie?).
Mark my words, some day, some Broadway producer is going to wake up and realize that a Louis Prima celebration would run for years. You’ll see.
argument, even if I didn’t exactly say it, that Louis Prima’s Sing, Sing, Sing is the greatest instrumental piece of the 20th and 21st centuries. Although it is always iffy to write on anything subjective being the “best,” the arguments in favor of Prima’s masterpiece being exceptional, perhaps unique, are formidable (I’m not writing it all over again – please go look at the post).I promised then, and promptly forgot, to write more on Prima. I’ll start with my personal opinion and take it from there. Prima is my favorite musician, bar none, ahead of Louis Armstrong, Richard Wagner, Peter Tchaikovsky, Bruce Springsteen and even Emerson, Lake & Palmer, the favorite group of my teenage years.
As with SSS’s pre-eminence, there are a host of supporting arguments why Prima should be counted at least in the top tier of twentieth century musicians, much more than say Benny Goodman, Glenn Miller, Frank Sinatra and other obvious choices might deserve it. The Capitol Records Collection of Prima’s hits has been played by this little blogger literally hundreds of times, both in my car and at parties. Almost every recording on it is infectious, charming, pulsing and clever. Rarely have I played it for guests without exceedingly positive comment or inquiry about it.
Let’s be more controversial though. Prima should be in the most select of musical hall of fames celebrating 20th century musicians and singers along with Louis Armstrong, The Beatles, Sinatra, Chuck Berry and few others.
Of course, the first powerful argument why Prima should be in this stellar group is, of course, that he wrote (and played and recorded) SSS. That alone makes him an immortal. One of the central arguments of my post about that song was how many times it has been used in film to help set the mood for the swing error. Only a few months after that post was written, we could already add another film to the list – George Clooney’s Leathernecks used it even though SSS was written and recorded long after the time period signified in that movie (the 20s) and I have found a number of other films I didn’t include.
There are other arguments though. Prima’s musical versatility, his highly popular Vegas stage act, his virtuoso performances on the trumpet, the extraordinary length of his music’s popularity right up to today (even if no one knows it), his unique singing style and skat singing credentials, are all extraordinary.
Prima has been dead since 1978, but we are continually hearing his music. Rarely a month goes by when I don’t stop what I’m doing and point out to whomever I’m with that the song on a television or radio commercial is a Prima piece, possibly by Prima himself. Although I have searched for information on all the commercials his music has been featured on, I have come up empty, but it is an enormous amount.
Since Prima’s death, aside from new versions of SSS, two other of his trademark songs have been re-recorded and made into hits. Few seemed to know at the time that they were even remakes. (I know this, because I asked).
David Lee Roth’s hit Just a Gigolo/I ain't got nobody, a rollicking and fun recording from 1985 started the recent Prima band wagon going. I note that the Wikipedia article on Roth does not mention his indebtedness to Prima at all for ratcheting up his career. Still, I have to admit that Prima did not write Just a Gigolo or I ain't got nobody, or even first record them. It actually is an Austrian song, and was first adapted to English in the 1920s. Yet, for good reason, we can have no problem giving Prima credit for inspiring Roth and even an earlier version by The Village People from the 70s.
How can we do this? Because Prima did something unique with his 1945 and 1956 recordings (the second with Sam Butera arranging) and Roth and the Village People both copied it (though the Village People did each song separately). Roth’s recording bears the names of both songs, just like Prima's did.
Just as Goodman co-opted S, S, S, so Prima has co-opted Just a Gigolo. It is his so much, that words from it were put on his tombstone.
Roth wasn’t the last to successfully honor Prima (reportedly Sam Butera called Roth out on not giving him any money for his arrangement when Roth came to visit him). Brian Setzer’s Jump, Jive and Wail was a faithful copy of Prima’s swing classic, which had been largely forgotten by the populous. It was also picked up by The Gap clothing stores as the theme for a popular commercial if you are trying to place it. Written in ’39 by Prima, a few years after SSS, it actually won a Grammy award with Setzer’s performance SIXTY YEARS after Prima wrote and performed it and over forty years after Prima’s most famous recording of the song. That’s staying power.
Although winning a Grammy is hardly part of the recipe for musical greatness (Britney Spears has won), Prima actually won himself in 1959 for That Old Black Magic, a song he covered with such pizzazz that his version makes all others seem dull and listless in comparison.
In fact, although Prima did not write all his hit songs, when you listen to his covers and compare them with anyone else’s, including the much more famous Sinatra, it is like comparing a search light with a light bulb. There is one exception I can think of – both Prima and the combination of Danny Kaye and The Andrews Sisters released covers of Civilization: Bongo Bongo Bongo at about the same time in 1947, when it was a hit in a Broadway play, and the Kaye/Andrews version did slightly better. No excuses, theirs is better (and one of my favorite non-Prima pieces).
How many classics can you name by Bing Crosby (mostly holiday songs, which is almost unfair) or Glenn Miller (maybe two) or Benny Goodman (probably one, and Prima wrote it)? Prima has a long list of hits you can still hear on television shows, movies and commercials today that he was recording until a few years before he died. Think about it, he wrote SSS in his mid-twenties and Jump, Jive an’ Wail before he was 30, both in the 1930s. The first is still the classic swing song and the second again a recent Billboard hit. Leaving aside Christmas songs, for who else does this repeatedly happen?
When you hear Louis Prima, there is no mistaking him. His voice, his Italian ethnic/jazz mixture is entirely unique and personal to him. I doubt it could be duplicated well, although someone should right the Broadway musical (if I had any musical ability, I’d give it a shot). When he sings, and he can sing well, he doesn’t worry about staying with the beat, or laughing in the middle of a song. Although scat singing is by definition a style unique to each practitioner, Louis Prima’s scat is somehow more unique than others, if that makes any sense. Just for the hell of it, here are this blog’s list of the three greatest scat singers in history (and Ella Fitzgerald is not one of them).
Louis Armstrong
Louis Prima
Danny Kaye (I know, who would have thought, but download the recording of Kaye and Armstrong doing When the Saints Come Marching In and you will see what I mean).
Prima swerves back and forth between English and Italian effortlessly and sometimes seemingly chaotically. He clowns with his band and especially with Keely Smith, his fourth wife and partner on stage. Sometimes he will challenge a band member to mimic his voice with his instrument. It is well known, and Sonny has confirmed it, that the dour faced Cher to Sonny’s happy sprite is a Prima/Smith copy. Often the songs seem like one big improvisation, but it was all the product of endless rehearsal.
Other than Keely Smith, the best known of Prima’s compatriots is the aforementioned and great Sam Butera, an electrifying saxophonist, who, like Smith, is still alive and still playing. Sam and Louis kid around like they grew up together. I’m still waiting for him to come around someday so I can hear him live.
Prima started out with a small band, but then had to go the big band route like everyone else in the 30s. When big band faded he went back to a smaller band and headed for Las Vegas where he was one of the greatest acts ever to play the City of Lights. After that, he slowly started to move into rock n’ roll, even progressive rock, although these are not among the bands greatest work.
Late in his career, a few years before he slipped into a three year coma and died, Prima recorded
for Disney the voice of King Louie, an orangutan determined to get the secret of fire from Mowgli in Jungle Book. It is still being covered by other bands. For a while, the legendary Mitch Miller produced Prima in a series of novelty songs which are not among my favorites, although some are up to his usual standards.Actually, before the animated Jungle Book, Prima was in a few movies himself, although these I have never, and will never likely, see. Although, if I did, it would be Hey, Boy! Hey, Girl!, if for nothing else, to see Louis and Keely perform the song.
Back in the Stone Age, I would just recommend you buy The Capitol Collectors Series: Louis Prima, but nowadays, you can just download the songs you like. Here’s my recommendation for the classic Prima download, many of them with, Keely Smith, although, if you want to buy a CD, that is still the one. Here’s the list:- Sing, Sing, Sing (get both the Prima vocal version and the Goodman 1938 classic recording with Gene Krupa and other stars)
- I’m Just a Gigolo/I Ain’t Got Nobody
- Jump, Jive an' Wail
- Buena Sera (there are several great versions – all good. I’d get at least two at different tempos)
- St. Louis Blues (perhaps the first great Jazz song; like most Prima covers, he just does it better than everyone else; again, try to get two with different tempos)
- Angelina/Zooma-Zooma medley
- Brooklyn Boogie (a real instrumental oldie, but one that really boogies)
- I’ve Got the World on a String
- Hey, Boy! Hey, Girl!
- I’ve Got You Under My Skin
- The Lip (this is one of his novelty songs, and lots of fun)
- The Music Goes Round and Round
- Oh, Marie- Pennies From Heaven
- That Old Black Magic
- Twist All Night (early rock & roll from a jazz master born in 1910)
- When You’re Smiling/The Sheik of Araby medley
- I've Got You Under My Skin
- I Want to be Like You (the Disney classic)
Leave aside SSS, for which I have already tried to list every movie and tv show which played it that I could find in the 12/10/07 post (and have found more since), Among the many, many uses of Prima’s other works in film and television includes:
Mission: Impossible III (2006)(A Sunday Kind of Love)Find Me Guilty (2006) (When You're Smiling (The Whole World Smiles with You))Where the Truth Lies (2005) (Josephine, Please No Lean on the Bell)Kicking & Screaming (2005) (Zooma, Zooma)Elf (2003) (Pennies From Heaven)Anger Management (2003) (When You're Smiling)Mafia: Lost Heaven (2002) (Long About Midnight, Sing It 'Way Down Low’, I'm Living In A Great Big Way)Don't Say a Word (2001) (Fee Fie Foo)Liberty Heights (1999) (A Sunday Kind of Love)Mickey Blue Eyes (1999) (Just a Gigolo, Buena Sera Senorita)Swing (1999) (Five Months Two Weeks Two Days)Analyze This (1999) (Angelina/Zooma Zooma, When You're Smiling/The Sheik of Araby)City of Angels (1998) (Hey! Ba-Ba-Re-Bop)Lolita (1997) (Civilization (Bongo Bongo Bongo)Big Night (1996) (Buona Sera, Oh Marie, Love of My Life (O Sole Mio), Five Months, Two Weeks, Two Days)Casino (1995) (Zooma Zooma, Zooma Zooma, Basin Street Blues/When It's Sleepy Time Down South, I'm Confessin' (That I Love You)Forget Paris (1995) (Lazy River)Cobb (1994) (That Old Black Magic)Mad Dog and Glory (1993) (That Old Black Magic, Just a Gigolo, I Ain't Got Nobody)Mystic Pizza (1988) (I Ain’t Got Nobody)The Man Called Flintstone (1966) (Pensate Amore)
This is just a small sample based on what shows or movies I would guess would be familiar to you. There are many, many more, and endless commercials.
When I write about someone on this post, it is almost always because I feel like they should be reverred and don't get enough ink. Prima was one of the all time greats, even if he is barely remembered today except by the older generation, despite the fact that his music is still recorded and used by others more than any almost anyone else (maybe I don't need the "almost" either). He started out and was successful in the dixieland era, through big bands, small stage bands and even some limited success in the rock era. Although Danny Thomas, the late comedian, is not exactly a musical authority, I'll go with his quote during the Las Vegas years about Louis Prima and the Witnesses (including Sam Butera): "Man for man, pound for pound, it is the greatest music organization in the world," although I could have went with Ed Sullivans "Greatest act in show business today".
Benny Goodman got the title "King of Swing" primarily for his great work on a Louis Prima song. If he's the king, the Prima should be emperor (Louis Armstrong fans, don't kill me. I know, I know -- can we call it a tie?).
Mark my words, some day, some Broadway producer is going to wake up and realize that a Louis Prima celebration would run for years. You’ll see.
Postnote 2020: Reviewing and correcting this post (I frequently fix the mostly grammatical but some outright errors in my posts much later than I wrote them) I note that Sam Butera and Keely Smith both passed on after I wrote this.
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About Me
- David
- I started this blog in September, 2006. Mostly, it is where I can talk about things that interest me, which I otherwise don't get to do all that much, about some remarkable people who should not be forgotten, philosophy and theories (like Don Foster's on who wrote A Visit From St. Nicholas and my own on whether Santa is mostly derived from a Norse god) and analysis of issues that concern me. Often it is about books. I try to quote accurately and to say when I am paraphrasing (more and more). Sometimes I blow the first name of even very famous people, often entertainers. I'm much better at history, but once in a while I see I have written something I later learned was not true. Sometimes I fix them, sometimes not. My worst mistake was writing that Beethoven went blind, when he actually went deaf. Feel free to point out an error. I either leave in the mistake, or, if I clean it up, the comment pointing it out. From time to time I do clean up grammar in old posts as, over time I have become more conventional in my grammar, and I very often write these when I am falling asleep and just make dumb mistakes. It be nice to have an editor, but . . . .