Neither Holy, Nor Roman…

The LA Times and KTLA 5:

A Muslim advocacy organization is requesting a Department of Justice investigation into whether comments made by Lancaster’s mayor were unconstitutional.

In his State of the City address last week, Mayor R. Rex Parris said Lancaster was “growing a Christian community.”

“And don’t let anybody shy away from that,” he said to an audience of ministers. “I need [Lancaster residents] standing up and saying we’re a Christian community, and we’re proud of that.”

The Greater Los Angeles area office of the Council on American-Islamic Relations sent a letter Friday to the department requesting an investigation into whether Parris’ comments violated the Constitution’s Establishment Clause, which bans the government from supporting or endorsing a religion.

“The divisive statement made by the mayor, when analyzed in context of other recent developments, represents a disturbing pattern by the city of Lancaster,” said Hussam Ayloush, executive director of CAIR-LA…

This piece is confusing on one level.  What a mayor states in a “state of the city” is one thing.  But what one states to “an audience of ministers” is rather something else.

Regardless, the comment in the “state of the city” raises a whole of host of cross-questions.  For one, replace the word “Christian” in that observation with the word “white”?  It would be hard to believe that mayor would ever have said that.  (Although had it been “black” or “Hispanic,” depending on the locale, that sounds rather different; and we have heard black mayors, and black politicians in most “black communities” come very close to speaking that way.)

There is no question the U.S. is a “Christian country“.  By that one means “country” with a small “c”.  That because some 8 out of 10 people living within its boundaries label themselves “Christian.”

There is also no question the U.S. does NOT have a “Christian government”.  It functions under a secular constitution.  In it, Christianity is unmentioned, “establishment” is prohibited and the free exercise of all religions is protected.

Interestingly, the group terming itself the Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) here has made a groundbreaking assertion insofar as its Islamic faith is concerned.  For nowhere in the world where Islam is practiced as the major faith, is any society nearly as “secular” governed as is the U.S.  The closest example is Turkey; but even Turkey is deeply divided of late, and is currently governed by a self-proclaimed (divisive?) Islamic political party.

Once, in mostly Christian lands, Christianity and the “public space” were virtually inseparable:

But in the last 400 years, Christianity has slowly been being ejected from that “public space.”

Interestingly, where followers of Islam predominate, there is no hesitancy to “seize” a “public square”.

Because in Islam one cannot “separate” religion from state.  For Islam cannot be separated from life.  So Islam dominating the “public space” is merely the proper order of life.

So what we have here is a change.  Meaning why this minor offering from a smalltown mayor is newsworthy at all is due to it having come from a Christian politician who overtly makes such a comment while in office.  That after it had long become deemed out of bounds for such statements to be made.  In turn, it is now a “Muslim group” that cites the secular U.S. Constitution as the basis for attacking that Christian politician’s comment.

Yet there is no good reason to believe if the U.S. had had a mostly Muslim population in 1787 that it would have composed the U.S. Constitution on its own.  Or would have wanted to.  Or would even have thought to.

Because followers of Islam had no desire that Islam not be at the heart of their lives.  So given Islam’s view of “the public square”, Muslims voicing being disturbed over someone else momentarily “seizing” the “public square” is itself not altogether surprising.  But what is different in this case is the citing of a secular constitution to do so.

And if the religions were reversed?  If enough Muslims had inhabited the U.S. historically there is no reason to believe a Muslim mayor would not have uttered the same thing, or that city engaged in a similarly “disturbing pattern” of behavior.  Indeed, the mayor probably wouldn’t have had to say as much, because he would have merely taken it for granted, and so would most of the populace.

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But in that case, there would in all likelihood have been in place no U.S. Constitution for non-Muslims to point to for relief from that “‘establishment”. Yet even where there is legal Christian “establishment,” in the 21st century there isn’t necessarily “establishment” in spirit.  The Telegraph:

The BBC’s head of religion has accused the Church of England of “living in the past” and said that the corporation should not give Christianity preferential treatment.

Aaqil Ahmed, a controversial executive whose appointment last year prompted more than 100 complaints, said: “I think all the faiths should be treated in the same way. I don’t believe in treating any faith differently.”…

In the secular West today, that is hardly a stunning opinion to hold in terms of a broad-based view of “the world.”  But it is worth bearing in mind that the BBC is also a “public space”: it is a taxpayer-funded state broadcaster in a “Christian country” that is also (unlike the U.S.), officially Christian.  So in a narrow job sense, as head of religious broadcasting for the BBC, that is a decidedly curious editorial stance for Mr Ahmed to suggest be pursued.

At least one might think it is, until one realizes Mr Ahmed is Muslim.

Le New York Times Dumps Le Tea

It is a shame that Le New York Times is adopting a pay model online. That seems almost sure to mean that impoverished readers will eventually miss out on the likes of op-eds such as this one.  Professor Robert Zaretzky, on Poujadists and Tea Partyists:

…Last week was the 55th anniversary of the mass demonstration in Paris of the Poujadist movement, a phenomenon that bears a close resemblance to our own Tea Party. For a brief moment, the movement threatened the very foundations of the French Republic. A comparison between France then and America now may be instructive…

Inexplicably, amidst remembrances of the 50th anniversary of the lunch counter sit-in in Greensboro, North Carolina, Americans — millions of whom have also recently been stuck in snowstorms and/or trying to get a job — typically managed to overlook that other anniversary.  It took longer than this writer thought would be the case, but the NYT here has re-discovered France’s “Poujadists.”  Unlike the Independent, though, the NYT feels the necessity to explain in some detail to NYT worldly (mostly American) readers just what Poujadists were.

That is probably a good thing, given that not even all NYT highly educated subscribers have advanced degrees in matters French, and knowledge of and interest in Poujadism today is restricted largely to the realm of graduate school. So it is unsurprising that to do the “instructing” the NYT employs a professor of French history. Also unsurprisingly, the professor somehow identifies a “close resemblance” between “Poujadists” and “Tea partyists”:

…By 1958, most Poujadists were ready to throw their support behind a far more impressive opponent of the Fourth Republic, Charles de Gaulle. When de Gaulle assumed power and held a referendum that replaced the parliamentary system with an authoritarian executive, Poujade’s former adherents overwhelmingly voted yes…

How exactly though, given that ultimate historical outcome, the professor feels able then to sit Poujadists alongside on the same bench as Tea Partyists, is little short of astounding. For the last thing Tea Partyists are apt “overwhelmingly” to support is an authoritarian executive. But that slip is probably unavoidable.

For the interested reader might well wonder if, handed an opportunity to pen a NYT op-ed, the professor could have resisted not trying to find many a “close resemblance”?  And given the assertion that Tea partyists must hate the French, what happens if there be “links” between Tea Partyists and that group of French “reactionaires?” The professor even alludes to that possibility:

…Tea Party activists might find it infuriating ever to be compared to the nation they consider the anti-America.

The implication apparently being that comparing them to the French will cause Tea Partyists to want to, uh, surrender?

But French observers of our country may be forgiven if they feel a certain déjà vu when they see a movement that brings nothing to the ballot box except anger.

Evidently unlike Tea Partyists, the professor clearly understands France NOT to be the “anti-America”. Although one doesn’t have to be American, or view that argument as “simplistic,” to assert that the study of modern France is almost entirely predicated on precisely the fact that France is.  Even as it must be borne in mind also that those of “simple” minds is what this is supposedly all about.

For in the piece we are treated to a juxtaposing of the two movements’ comparative layers, and especially, as the professor shares, their “common tendency to grasp for simple solutions to complex problems.” Yet that some “complex problems” may well actually have “simple solutions”? Such is evidently not considered within the realm of intellectual possibility.

Yet the commonalities detailed by the professor generally inhabit the realm of the hardly profound. Poujadists didn’t like heavy taxes; Tea Partyists don’t like heavy taxes. (Apparently, the NYT does?) Poujadists held a mass protest; Tea Partyists held a mass protest. (And who doesn’t, nowadays, hold a “mass protest”?) Poujadists proclaimed they didn’t like Paris AND Washington; Tea Partyists don’t much like Washington either AND … come to think of it, they don’t actually pay nearly as much attention to Paris as do scholars of French history, although if and when it may cross their minds, it is quite probable, yes, that Tea Partyists indeed don’t much like Paris either.

But the most relevant “close resemblance” touchstones appear decidedly lacking.  Pierre Poujade himself fronted that political movement that is identified by his name and which also competed as a party in elections.  But where has Le Tea Party been on any U.S. ballot?

Vitally, who is Tea Partyists’ Pierre Poujade? A movement named after a charismatic leader needs … what, one supposes? A charismatic leader?

You might think so, and perhaps we will discover one at this so-called Tea Party Convention. But one Glenn Beck doesn’t seem to cut quite the right figure. However it cannot be keynote speaker Sarah Palin either.

Despite her rhetoric Ms Palin was, remember, a national candidate for one of the two “taxing” parties.  Moreover she is making her keynote at this gathering for a reported $100,000 fee.  So if she isn’t likely to be happily universally acclaimed leader by a convention dedicated to lowering spending, she is at least a terrific opening act.

Still, following on with the comparisons, if President Obama is, as the professor posits, another Pierre Mendès-France — he of “foreign” origin “similar” to President Obama — is the President also quietly planning on pulling out of Indochina Afghanistan and negotiating with Ho Chi Minh Osama bin Laden? Also is President Obama’s successor plus one going to find himself colluding with a British prime minister and the Israelis in a shared assault to seize the Suez Panama Canal?

Above all, who is America’s “man” on a (white?) horse, General de Gaulle?  Sarah Palin doesn’t exactly cut an “L’Amerique, c’est moi” figure. And even if Senator McCain possesses a more Gaullist-like family pedigree and impressive military background (and also the advanced age), and has also been rejected by voters much as de Gaulle had been, the Arizona senator doesn’t seem a likely personage to be seized upon by various generals and others as the only leader capable of fronting a coup in order to preserve Algérie française “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.” Even despite what one Ms Dowd seems to believe.

The overarching issue is it appears some are determined that Tea Partyists must be just like Poujadists … except when they are not.  That appears to overlook that Tea Partyists are at the root actually NOT even much like tea partyists.  As the professor is not an instructor on early America, it is therefore understandable he probably isn’t quite as clear on this, but the originals from December 1773, we may recall, were angered especially by taxation without representation.

Interestingly, according to the Census Bureau in 1995:

The total number of the nation’s popularly elected officials was 511,039 in 1992, according to a report released by the Commerce Department’s Census Bureau. Less than 4 percent were in federal (Congress and the White House) and state governments, while the remaining 96 percent were in local governments…

The number of representatives has increased since then.  Thus today’s Tea Partyists and all other Americans have substantial representation.  And while it appears, yes, that Americans have indeed “had it,” as we are also widely witnessing many want it made understood that they have also “had it” for quite some time.

Denmark Threatens The Children?

Fox NY:

A 9-year old Staten Island boy got in trouble for bringing a Lego figure to school. The figure also had a small gun — and that’s what prompted his principal to take disciplinary action.

Patrick Timoney’s mother says the principal confiscated the toy and wanted to suspend Patrick.

“He’s a really a good kid and the fact that he was this upset over something that needed to just be, ‘Hey, don’t bring that to school, just put it away in your bag.’ And it would’ve been done,” said Laura Timoney.

The principal checked with the Department of Education, which said that although the city has a zero tolerance policy toward toy guns, the matter was resolved with a conference with the parent and student.

Calling it a “small gun” is a large exaggeration: as the video report demonstrates, it was so small it sat completely within an adult’s palm, not even the size of two quarters.  One might not have even thought it resembled a gun until looking at it really closely.

We need to spend more on education? That is all we forever keep hearing. But after a lifetime of working in higher education, yours truly no longer accepts that as gospel.

We appear to spend quite enough already.  Indeed, all our increased spending in recent decades has created college students who often cannot form a sentence, courtesy of 12 years under today’s public “educational professionals”.  Among them there is little to no accountability, and, even worse, too often little intelligence, let alone wisdom.

Students aren’t benefiting, and all the money we keep throwing at public education is, frankly, appearing to saddle us merely with a disproportionate number of chair-warming “professional educational” slackers, and/or martinetish “administrative” nitwits.  If students are bright, that is almost always because they come from “bright households.”  It certainly isn’t owing to the child’s “schooling.”

Case in point.  Yours truly’s sister — an extremely articulate, attractive woman who can also speak French, Italian and Russian fluently and has a master’s degree — thought a few years’ back to get NYS teacher certification.  What a mistake.

While in her “education” university classes, she noticed the “education” students were not exactly the sharpest tacks in the box.  Then, when student-teaching, she understood where that led.  She was horrified by the depths of rank ignorance all too common among the actual employed “educators.”

Almost all she met were in teaching for the (extremely HIGH) unionized pay (no longer are tenured teachers “poor”), the health insurance and other benefits.  Alfred North Whitehead, to say the least, was not their guiding light.  Almost all could never, she observed, ever hope to get a similar high-paying job in private industry.  Most were “just too stupid.”

Initially, she made the mistake of thinking she should, perhaps, lead a class while suited in a woman’s business-style attire?  She was immediately told off.  She was, it was explained to her, “overdressed” and conveyed “too much authority”; and wearing heels was “too sexual.”

She related tales of what went on in high school classrooms between juvenile teachers and students that would make most of today’s (older) parents’ hair stand on end. And in a GOOD school district on Long Island, no less. Real teachers, it seems, turn up to teach English lit in sweats and sneakers, and trade flatulence jokes with students.

The kids regularly were sat in circles in the middle of classroom, with the teacher moving between them in their groups, “overseeing” them essentially “teaching” each other.  The notion of a “lecture” was from another era.  When she was inexplicably able to assign a bit of actual challenging reading, one parent rang her the next day at the school office and she worried for a moment, only to hear from the other end: “He came home with a novel!  Thank you!”

Overall, utterly disheartened and saddened by the experience, she lamented to yours truly, “It was nothing like when we went to school.”  She never tried to use that certification.  The thought of struggling against that imbecilic tide daily sickened her.

So if this on Staten Island is yet another example of the educational administrational “educate our children” brilliance all our ever-increasing education spending is buying us?  We might just as well return to the one room school house.  Because it wasn’t a gun, or even a toy gun; it was a piece of Lego.

Land Of Heavyweights

CBS News headline:

How Americans Eat Today

You don’t even have to read the piece in detail to suspect the overall answer: not well.

Growing up here in the 1970s and early 1980s, none of this writer’s then classmates were “heavy” by today’s standards, much less “obese.”  Oh, yes, there was the occasional “chubby” kid.  But, looking back, those kids were slim and healthy compared to many a child today.

It is no secret that kids today, eating ever more junk food and getting little exercise compared to most of those a generation or two ago, are growing up far heavier.  The prime reason that is a major worry is because we all put on some weight naturally as we age, so the obese child of age 8 is going to be a huge adult (and perhaps very ill, or even dead) by age 40.  And teenage obesity is now thought perhaps to contribute even to eventual MS.

Philosophy on the Mesa asks, “Is staying slim a moral responsibility?”  Meaning is the issue one of personal responsibility?  Undoubtedly it is to some degree.

But a much wider (no pun intended) problem also has got to be addressed.  The wife and I got to talking about this recently, when we were stunned to see what is being pushed by a current Dunkin’ Donuts TV commercial which seems to be on “heavy rotation.”  (Again, no pun intended.)  Brand Week, November 2009:

…Dunkin’ will run promotions for the new chicken sandwich via in-store signage, while its tuna sandwich will be touted via POP, 30-second radio clips, digital banner ads and out-of-home materials. The campaign will center on the slogan, “Afternoons Run on Dunkin’…

If in the States, you may have seen this Dunkin’ TV ad?: “a chicken sandwich or wrap to power you through your afternoon.”  Presumably, the campaign above from DD has produced the TV commercial we saw which depicts a guy fading from hunger at his warehouse shop desk “in the afternoon.”  What he urgently needs to get through that afternoon is — of course! — a chicken sandwich!

But wait a second, when did a sandwich become something to get you “through”?  It is not a Kit Kat.  It is a meal.

Also, it is afternoon.  Why is he starving?  Didn’t he just have lunch?

Incredible.  Essentially, DD is there encouraging people to have a fourth meal daily.  And that “Eat more!” sales pitch is hardly confined to just Dunkin’ Donuts.

One reason for that being, when one eats more, one often . . . buys more!  One example, Ruby Tuesday’s offering of four burgers as a course — apparently imagining terming them “mini” means customers need feel no guilt about buying and consuming four burgers.  Nor that customers will notice that their check is also larger. (Again, no pun intended.)

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Culinary delights offered by Olive Garden and Red Lobster

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Portions in most chain restaurants now are often large enough to replace an average house slab foundation, and often taste about as good.  Yet despite that blandness, though, the mother-in-law, when visiting here from Britain last summer, observed that she thought food also tasted “sweeter” than in Britain — as if everything has added sugar in it.  Yours truly’s mother — who is an excellent cook — is utterly convinced that something new is being added to much pre-packaged food.

The obesity disaster in the U.S. is now embedded in the business-cultural: Americans are often reared to clear their plates; so the more that is piled on them, the more Americans will stuff down.  Thus it is no longer a question of this or that reform, or abstaining from a daily soft drink.  Wholesale attitudinal changes towards food — especially portion sizes and what is in those portions — are necessary.

So “reality” shows like “The Biggest Loser” are merely treating the latest victims.  Because while on one hand most decry the country’s widening waistlines, the next crop of the obese are simultaneously played the siren song by Dunkin’ Donuts as to how they simply cannot stagger from lunch all the way to dinner without another meal in-between.  Despite the plain fact that that new-found inability to make it 5-6 hours without starving to death, would certainly be news to those who’ve preceded us in this life and somehow daily managed that feat without one.

And those who already have “problems” with food, are being “entertained” by the likes of The Travel Channel’s “Man v. Food”:

Will Adam finish off the 10-lb super-stuffed pizza challenge at Randy’s Wooster?

Who knows?  But if Adam feasts like that regularly, he will definitely finish himself off soon enough.

“Why War”?

On Friday, the British Iraq “inquiry” finally had Mr Blair in the hot seat.  BBC headline:

Iraq inquiry hears defiant Blair say: I’d do it again

His testimony was predictable.  Also predictable were the views voiced from those opposed.

There will never be anything approaching a “consensus” on the campaign in Iraq.  And not even if the country 25 years from now is a single state (or even three states) functioning under a reasonable (or three reasonable) government(s).

Which is why we have to participate in yet another “Why We Went To War,” much as Newton Baker in the aftermath of another far more consuming and destructive conflict, had tried to explain to another generation.

Now, We Die On Facebook

I just heard from my mother: a relative a month older than myself died yesterday.

He had not been in good health at all, so it wasn’t a total surprise.  Still, it was a shock.  I reminded my mother that it was a good idea I heard it first from her.

Otherwise, I would have first seen it on Facebook.  Ironic especially that his last post a few days ago was this joke: he wanted everyone to stop following him!

Now, he will be inundated.  His sister, godchild, and other relatives and friends, have been writing all over his “wall.”

This, now, is becoming commonplace.  As I told my wife: “This is my first personal Facebook fatality.”

At one time, a book’ of condolence was at a funeral home, or similar.  Now, we also leave words on the web.  Presuming that no one else has his password, his profile and all with his account, will remain.

No one will alter it.  As long as Facebook exists, in a sense, so will he: a photo still looking at all of us; a picture still there among our friends.

I always thought I would never be one of those in this situation who leave a message on the “wall” of a deceased.  Having just done so, I realized I did it not for him, of course.  I did it for those closest to him: as one would do in a group gathering, trying to offer a little comfort, so they all will know that someone else cared enough to do so.

And others will do the same: the “wall” will fill.  “Social networking” is about living and keeping in touch.  As it ages, and we do also, it is, increasingly, now, also about how we die.

An Aspiring Writer Never Knows How “Fame” Will Arrive…

…or exactly for what, when and why.  USA Today “Game On!” blog:

Former NBA journeyman turned author Paul Shirley has written a long piece on flipcollective.com explaining why he has refused to contribute money to help Haiti rebuild.

Shirley is smart enough to explain his position clearly and clearly smart enough to realize that his position makes him look, to some, like an unfeeling clod.

ESPN released a statement saying he would no longer be a contributor for them…

USA Today quotes from the article.  One is this:

“…If it were apparent that Haiti would likely rebuild in an earthquake-resistant way, and if a cure could be found for hurricane abuse of island nations, then maybe one could imagine putting a sustained effort into rebuilding the place. But that would only be feasible if the country had shown any ability to manage its affairs in the past, which it has not done…”

This blog is not generally quick to accept the flippant findings of major media.  Therefore, yours truly — several times — read his entire piece.  Having done so, it was immediately clear it was worse than even that USA Today post implied:

…We did the same after Hurricane Katrina. We were quick to vilify humans who were too slow to respond to the needs of victims, forgetting that the victims had built and maintained a major city below sea level in a known target zone for hurricanes. Our response: Make the same mistake again. Rebuild a doomed city, putting aside logic as we did.

And now, faced with a similar situation, it seems likely that we will do the same.

He should have stopped there, but didn’t:

Shouldn’t there be some discourse on how the millions of dollars that are being poured into Haiti will be spent? And at least a slight reprimand for the conditions prior to the earthquake? Some kind of inquisition? Something like this?:

Dear Haitians –

First of all, kudos on developing the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Your commitment to human rights, infrastructure, and birth control should be applauded.

As we prepare to assist you in this difficult time, a polite request: If it’s possible, could you not re-build your island home in the image of its predecessor? Could you not resort to the creation of flimsy shanty- and shack-towns? And could some of you maybe use a condom once in a while?

Sincerely,

The Rest of the World…

More of the same followed.  Had Mr Shirley signed off with “…And now, faced with a similar situation, it seems likely that we will do the same.” he would merely have composed a callous and pedestrian op-ed which might have attracted little wider comment.  Indeed, yours truly had momentarily thought that was the finish, because it was a natural break.

Yet Mr Shirley, obviously warming to his subject, could not evidently bring himself to call it a post and move on; he had still more to say — unfortunately, way too much more.  From then on he flushed his own head down an op-ed toilet.  Beginning with that snide observation that Haitians should have used more condoms so they didn’t reproduce as readily.

Mr Shirley could not possibly have been hit in the head over time with so many basketballs as to be shocked ESPN parted company with him after word got to that company that he had composed the likes of that brilliance?  Mostly anonymous commenters at his post who sympathize with his essential viewpoint have gone to some lengths to defend his supposed groundbreaking logic.  They note also how he is just being refreshingly honest and courageous.

Leaving aside that it doesn’t really take any courage to assert, “Let them die!”, such “intellectualism” itself constitutes at best 2% of his disjointed piece.  The other 98% is an ahistorical, heartless mess.  It is largely devoid of context, appreciation of time and place, and reads as self-satisfied and superior.

But between his hammerings of people who short of being dead cannot now possibly be any more down than they are now, there is always the carefully placed caveat offering sympathy.  He knows Haitians could never just leave the island.  Yet why are they still living there?

Such profound ramblings are peppered amidst comparisons of Haitians to “homeless people” to whom he wouldn’t give money to on the street, to victims of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami who ridiculously chose to live near the sea, and to African famine victims who stupidly starved a generation ago — “…giving more food to poor people allows them to create more poor people…” — when, really, all they needed to do was find something to eat for themselves. (How could any of them never have thought of trying that?)

All of that offered up in the tone of an arrogant high school kid who imagines he has it pegged right while everyone else are idiots conned and guilted into being willing to subsidize the world’s idle, “surplus populations”.

Meanwhile, currently, tens of thousands of dead in Haiti are being bulldozed into mass graves.  Their fates and burial locations are forever unknown with certainty to family and friends.  If any family and friends survived, too, that is.

It is no secret Haiti had been ill-governed and suffering from extreme poverty for centuries.  Yet Mr Shirley simplemindedly reduces the myriad of reasons for that long-term plight to Haitians aiming to be poor.  The follow on to that sublime interpretation being that owing to their centuries of wallowing in that poverty when they should have long ago snapped out of it, their failing to do so justifies everyone else turning heads to Haitians’ post-earthquake suffering.

Because once their piles of dead are buried, Haitians, Mr Shirley opines, will just return to dwelling in their shantytowns and being poor.  And what will they want from us all next?  Won’t they ever learn?  Why don’t they just put their panhandling cup aside and turn the country into another Denmark?

All of which is why, from Kansas City — which is a metro area on a riverfront, yet Mr Shirley doesn’t appear interested in relocating that locality? — Mr Shirley takes to the web to proclaim to all and sundry who stumble upon his insights why he doesn’t want to give.

His privilege certainly.  No one is holding a gun to his head demanding he do so.  Mr Shirley is free to subscribe to the notion, “If he be like to die, he had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”

But he had better be careful in so smugly adopting it, for, remember, it is never entirely certain whom the “surplus population” happens to be.

No matter how poor or malgoverned the country had nearly always been before the earth shook back on January 12, Haiti was, by all accounts, NEVER before ever this badly off.  For example, WARNING: this link is to a photo of a mass burial that is very disturbing and even reminiscent of horrific images from Nazi extermination camps.  So much so that yours truly did not want it directly appearing on this blog and surprising any visitors.

One has to wonder if perhaps he wishes by now that he had never pushed publish?  This is the piece through which Mr Shirley had hoped to become MUCH better known as a writer?  Regardless, judging from the thousand plus comments and links, it doesn’t matter: he is well-known for it now.

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UPDATE:  USA Today’s above crediting Mr Shirley with “smarts” is itself worrying in its own way.  Or we have actually really lowered the intellectual bar that much.  For the piece’s ugly assertions notwithstanding, based on its fundamentally empty and juvenile argumentative style, this blog, frankly, is convinced that Mr Shirley is nowhere near as “smart” as USA Today appears inclined to think he is, or as Mr Shirley clearly fancies himself as being.

What Is “Old” Is “New” (Or “Sioux”)

The BBC, providing free advertising “reporting” on a “report” which “investigated” whether it is even possible to battle “climate change,” composed by a group calling itself The New Economics Foundation (a name which, presumably, is not meant to evoke recollections of Lenin’s “New Economic Policy”):

…None of the existing models or policies could “square the circle” of economic growth with climate safety…

…In the report, Growth Isn’t Possible, the authors looked at the main models for climate change and energy use in the global economy…

And the “report” came to the conclusion that economic growth is — as if its title didn’t give it away? — out of the question if we are simultaneously serious about arresting “climate change.”  Still, all is not hopeless.  There is perhaps one way forward:

…The report concluded an economy that respected environmental thresholds, which include biodiversity and the finite availability of natural resources, would be better placed to deliver human well-being in the long run…

The BBC did not share with us any historical example from the NEF “report” of a “better placed” economy which had.  Despite that unfortunate oversight, this blog immediately thought of one possibility.  And in the absence of any others, it could well serve as something of a model — although, it is of course also arguable as to whether it really did indeed “deliver” widespread economic “well-being in the long run”:

But assuming for the sake of argument that the Sioux managed it, and despite what that NEF “report” calls for, precisely how 7 billion people will subsist almost entirely off hunting — especially when hunting is increasingly judged beyond the moral pale — is difficult readily to envisage.

And especially when, as USA Today tells us:

Among 21 social and economic issues, global warming ranks last as a top priority to Americans, who view it as increasingly less urgent, according to a survey released Monday by the Pew Research Center for People & the Press…

For if we can but only rarely in life assert “the politics is settled,” the above certainly looks as if “the politics” preclude any effort anytime soon to implement a global return to hunting and gathering.

Montana’s Great Threat To Sheffield

The Telegraph:

“What number should you ring in the case of an emergency?” Diane Abbott, the Labour MP, asked children in a primary school she once visited.

“911″ came back the reply – unexpected for her but perfectly logical for the children.

Such an example shows just how pervasive American imports have become, according to Greg Childs, secretary of the campaign group Save Kids’ TV.

He warned: “We are creating a generation of disengaged children because they do not see themselves or hear themselves in their own voices.

“They live in the mid-Atlantic world, where they are more comfortable with the streets of Los Angeles and New York than London or Sheffield.”…

Really? And just because they see cartoon tales of Egypt, they are fully prepared to cope with real-life Egypt?

The average British child see lots of images of NY and LA, and may even know to ring 911 if in need.  Yet that same child if alone would actually find NY or LA more familiar and navigable than Sheffield or London?  That remarkable assertion is incredibly difficult to credit, without being backed up by serious evidence.

…Children nationwide are now more likely to know the phrases “sweet niblets” or “ye doggies” from Hannah Montana, the Disney children’s show starring Miley Cyrus, or “I’m ready”, the catchphrase of SpongeBob SquarePants, than what Ivor the Engine sounds like…

…He asked: “If it’s thought that it’s the right of adults to see drama that reflects their lives, then why isn’t that a right for children too?”

But is it actually thought to be such a right, and by whom?  And what does that mean anyway, to see “yourself” on TV?  Does “Lost” reflect routine American lives, while  “Dr Who” is representative of the lives of ordinary Britons?

British children are certainly exposed to more American culture through TV than had been the case 40 years ago.  Yours truly’s nieces and nephews are evidence of that.  One niece was for a time utterly taken by “Dora the Explorer,” in which an Hispanic girl is the “star” of the cartoon series.

So some really need to get their cultural-prescriptions straight.  For, on one level, some will go to great lengths to get children to “experience diversity.”  On the other, here, Save Kids’ TV — the interestingly named — Mr Childs is asserting that UK children’s TV should be reduced to a much narrower world?

In fact, probably it is next worth asking whose “British” world would that be precisely?  Meaning how does Mr Childs define British, in order to make sure all UK children enjoy TV programming “that reflects their lives?”  Indeed, does Mr Childs also believe that one Diane Abbott’s childhood and upbringing is “reflective” of that of most UK children?

The Telegraph continues:

Fewer than 17 per cent of children’s programmes broadcast on UK channels are made here, according to Ofcom.

Of those, 46 per cent are American…

Whenever some variation of this issue rears its head, it tends to overlook that cross-cultural “fertilization” is a two-way street.  American children are inundated in turn with UK-origin TV, films and pop music.  Mr Childs has heard of “Harry Potter?”  And evidently he does not recall all those millions of American kids who — still — innocently memorize the lyrics to “Penny Lane” and “Strawberry Fields Forever?”

That while having no clue what real places those actually are?  And when those young people do that, quite probably at terrible career cost to numerous American-origin performers, who as a consequence sell much less music than they might have had there been no Fab Four?  Or, more recently, similarly, what American acts might benefit if there were no Coldplay?  Or no Leona Lewis?  And the list could go on.

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Leona Lewis: “Bleeding” American pop performers’ jobs, and underminer of American youth national identity

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Film and television from their early days were decried in some circles as the dangerous vehicles through which we would all sound the same — Hollywood.  National identities would vanish.  Even regional ones would greatly be diminished.

That hasn’t happened even within the U.S., despite a Boston child seeing the same “Hannah Montana” as one in Houston.  In an Anglo-American vein, yours truly and the Wife were a few years’ back sitting in a London restaurant talking with a visiting American friend.  He mentioned how, back at his hotel, he had just seen the end of a football (soccer) match, and after it a guy named “Cara…something or other” was interviewed.

“Jamie Carragher?” the English wife asked?

“Yeh!  That was his name!  I didn’t get a word he said!”

That among us 40ish adults.  Insofar as UK children are concerned, their familiarity with “Hannah Montana,” and “The Simpsons,” and a host of other American programming is beyond dispute.  Yet while they may adopt the odd “American” word and phrase from what they see on them — so can utter “Doh!” as second nature — decades after such American TV shows became commonplace in Britain, exactly how many Sheffield kids now have American accents?

One Wonders Why There Are “Tea Partyists”?

In the wake of Mr Brown’s surprise Massachusetts U.S. Senate win, media is suddenly informing us that voters are furious with government “spending.”

Separately, liberal commentators, such as the NYT Bob Herbert, are proclaiming politicians — especially Democrats — just “don’t get it”:

…With the power elite consumed with its incessant, discordant fiddling over health care, the economic plight of ordinary Americans, from the middle class to the very poor, got pathetically short shrift. And there is no evidence, even now, that leaders of either party fully grasp the depth of the crisis, which began long before the official start of the Great Recession in December 2007…

. . . and a pox on both their houses:

…The Republican Party has abandoned any serious approach to the nation’s biggest problems, economic or otherwise. It may be resurgent, but it’s not a serious party. That leaves only the Democrats, a party that once championed working people and the poor, but has long since lost its way.

Actually, Republicans argue one major issue that must be dealt with is runaway government “spending”.  But even if some politicians are somehow not “out of touch” and have not “lost” their way, and even if voters kept them and threw out every “bum”?  And even more dramatically, even if voters emptied the entire Congress and reseated 535 new people?

Nothing will “change.”  And why not?  Because elected officials’ — regardless of party — room to policy maneuver is now so limited anyway.