Sunday, January 24, 2010

Grammar Police Redux



A great many Republicans of late are taking umbrage at news reports regarding the victory of their own candidate, Scott Brown, in taking what has been called "Ted Kennedy's Senate seat." They are mightily offended that anyone suggest, imply, or flat-out say that that seat belonged to the late Senator Kennedy.

I suppose I should not be surprised that their inability to comprehend their own native tongue reflects the same rigid inflexibility they exhibit when "discussing" anything else. Nor should I be surprised that they are so willing to politicize something which, even though it's talking about politics, is NOT a political issue. So I am not surprised. But I am disenheartened. No one would be able to get away with making such stupid statements if we still had proper grammar education in our schools.

English is a prehensile language, and sometimes its ability to bend and flex and stretch causes problems. However, the lack of understanding that English can so bend and flex and stretch should never be the root of what has become a disinformation campaign. I don't know who is worse: the people who dropped grammar education from our standard curriculum, or the people who have cynically exploited that for their own nefarious purposes.

Yes, "Ted Kennedy's Senate seat" can, under one interpretation, mean "the seat owned by/belonging to" Ted Kennedy. HOWEVER, it also can mean "the seat most recently occupied by and identified with" Ted Kennedy. Furthermore, we all know journalism abhors both the passive voice ("something is done by someone" as opposed to "someone does something") and long, drawn-out sentences (why I'll never be a journalist, alas). Thus, "Ted Kennedy's Senate seat" is merely journalism's way of saying "the Senate seat most recently occupied by and identified with Ted Kennedy."

So I beg of you, those of you who are blathering on in protest about "Ted Kennedy's Senate seat," give it a rest, already! You're only making yourselves look foolish. Before you sound off again, please take a moment to consider Mark Twain's sage advice: better to keep your mouth shut and let people think you're an idiot than to open it and remove all doubt.

Friday, January 22, 2010

As The Stomach Churns, Part Two



I have to admit, I find it shocking that people are defending the majority's decision in the Supreme Court's overturning yesterday of campaign-financing reform laws. Nevertheless, reading some of the comments published online in response to various news reports about the decision, it seems the American public is just as divided as was the Court. And that leaves me once again frightened for the future of not just America, the country, but America, the idea.

I take a backseat to no one in my devotion to the First Amendment. Anyone who knows me at all knows I am a thoroughgoing champion of free speech and the free press, freedom of assembly, freedom of religion, and the right to petition the government. But anyone who knows me also knows that these freedoms do not include the right, for example, to yell "Fire!" in a crowded theater when there is no fire--for the danger to the public safety of inciting panic outweighs the individual's right to say what he likes willy-nilly. For the same reason, the Founding Fathers always knew and recognized [read the Federalist Papers if you don't believe me--Ed.] that what they were protecting was political speech. Commercial speech, the right to hawk one's goods, as it were, was never intended to get the same level of protection. Otherwise, we'd have no truth in advertising laws, and people who were damaged by lies such as "oh, this product is 100% safe" when the product was, in fact, toxic, would have no legal recourse. Then again, in the days before the publication of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, many people didn't care. What you don't know can't hurt you . . . except that it can, and frequently does.

But how anyone can equate a corporation with a living, breathing human being is utterly beyond me. We are the United States of America, not the United Corporations of America. Our system is "of the people, by the people, and for the people" not "of, by, and for the Corporation."

Corporations do not have the right to cast ballots in either primary or general elections. Corporations exist to make profits for their owners. They have no other raison d'etre. They do not care about right and wrong, good and bad, or any of the other higher concerns that motivate individual people. Corporations are at best amoral, artificial creatures, which do not exist outside the laws governing their creation and operation. Their behavior thus can be regulated according to the public will. Their only stake in our system of government is to do whatever they can within the law to minimize risk and maximize profit.

But they do have an inordinate amount of money to throw around, and that raw economic power alone puts them in opposition to being regulated by government. After all, when they can make an extra $10 per toy, for example, if they don't have to ensure that said toy is lead-free, they will not spend the money to make the toy lead-free . . . unless an outside regulatory force, government, makes them do so.

Government exists to do the things we as individuals cannot do for ourselves. In its own way, it's "the cost-effective" option. Better for us, as individuals, to have one government agency out there to test and regulate toys for lead content than to force every family in the country to buy lead-testing kits along with every single new toy. We ARE the government. Government is not our enemy. It is our agent, our collective representative. Its raison d'etre is to protect our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Corporations are not alive; they are not free (they don't exist except within the context of the laws); and happiness is NOT their pursuit. Their pursuit is to make money. The most money for the least possible cost. Period.

These are facts. They cannot be disputed. I concede that the implications of these facts are disputed, but too often the dispute is not about the merits of whatever is at issue. The dispute too often becomes a cover for expression of one's personal political proclivities at the expense of genuine discussion and debate. For example, the vast majority of the people posting comments supporting the Court's majority ruling takes a very bullying, schoolyard tone. Most of those people's comments do not rise above the level of name-calling and insulting those with whom they disagree. That alone suggests that those people are in the wrong, for if the facts are on your side, you should be stressing the facts, not making personal attacks on anyone else.

To all you who wrote in favor of the majority's ruling: you who say that this is a great victory for the First Amendment and truly free speech, and who believe that the Internet will protect the full expression and circulation of all ideas, are forgetting something: if the corporate owners of your access to the Internet decide to pull the plug, what will you do then?

Money in politics is like steroids in sports--especially baseball--it distorts everything in favor of those who have the most clout. Again, corporations are not people; corporations do not vote. What if all the shareholders but one in a corporation dislike the position the corporation has chosen to support financially, but the one shareholder has the controlling vote? The controlling shareholder thus essentially gets double expression of his idea since he can express it through his individual vote AND through the corporation's spending. All the other shareholders can cast their individual votes otherwise, but if the one shareholder, through his corporation's money's clout, has the ear of the people in office, they're going to listen to him, not the other shareholders. For they know that if they don't listen to him, he'll put his money and resources at the disposal of their political opponents. "Pay to play" and "get paid to play" will become the norm, not standing up for the larger public good.

If you disagree with this analysis, fine, but answer me this: if my analysis is so wrong, so off-the-beam, why do corporations spend millions and millions of dollars every day on lobbyists and advertising? Because lobbying and advertising work. Jane and John Q. Public's voices can hardly be heard above the din of all the money that's in the system now. Removing the few regulations that were in place until yesterday's ruling means the silencing of Jane and John for good. Maybe not in one fell swoop, but ultimately . . . what do they say in Las Vegas? "Money plays."

Money plays. Money wins. No longer will the best ideas win because of their intrinsic merits. The best ideas will never even get heard. The ideas that win will be the ideas that have the most money behind them. Furthermore, it is error to presume that getting tons of financial support is a sign of being the best idea. It is a sign only of the idea which is in the best interests of those with the most money to spend, which may be antithetical to the best interests of you and of me, we who are supposed to be the beneficiaries of the system.

I was afraid this would happen back when the Court announced it would hear the case. I even wrote about it in this blog. See "Overshadowed In Yesterday's News," posted 9/10/09. I will say at this point that I am sick to death of the way EVERYTHING has become politicized in this country. Some things ought to be bigger than politics, and the fact that nothing any longer is saddens me. Maybe "America" cannot work, for the very freedoms it protects enable the seeds of its own destruction to sprout and grow. For my part, 99% of the hope I felt at this time last year has gone right down the drain.

To conclude with a bit of hyperbole: this Supreme Court ruling truly is the worst thing to happen to people as individuals since the Dred Scott case, for in effect, it makes you and me and every other person who is not a CEO or CFO de facto chattel of those who are. Not all at once, mind you. Just after our access to all ideas has been so squeezed and so circumscribed by those with the money, hence the power, to press incessantly for their points of view that we will be anesthetized or otherwise beaten into submission.

Still, in every "good" there is a "bad," and vice versa. At least the lie that "conservative" justices hew to "original intent" has been put to death once and for all. This ruling is activist in the extreme. Radical, I daresay. Not that that matters to the right-wingers who insist on politicizing everything. As far as they are concerned, it's only "activism" when they disagree with the outcome. Anyone with intellectual honesty and integrity, however, must admit that "activism" is "activism." It's only bad when it takes us (collectively, as a society) backwards and not forwards.

Thursday, January 21, 2010

As The Stomach Churns



I have had a lot to say about a lot of subjects, but the real world has kept me from being able to take the time to say it . . . at least, so far this year. But I do have to make a few quick observations about subjects I'd normally like to cover in depth.

(1) I don't know why everyone is reporting with such sturm und drang about how terrible it is that the Democratic Party has lost its "60-vote, filibuster-proof" majority in the US Senate. If the current debacle surrounding the proposed health care legislation has shown us anything, it has shown us that while the Democrats may have had 60 votes in name, they NEVER had them in actual fact. So get over it, already! A change that makes no difference is really no change at all.

(2) Let's hope the Democrats learn the correct lesson from this, however, and start acting like Democrats again, instead of trying to be the GOP-lite. The minority Republicans who have been crowing that the results of the Massachusetts special election Tuesday show that the country wants the Democrats to practice "more inclusive" politics are full of W%R^&%^**&&^$%. The real Democrats, the true progressives in the party, according to all the post-election polls I've seen, largely stayed home. They want Democrats to be Democrats, not start from the center and move right to try to accommodate a minority that thinks it's still the majority.

(3) Nonetheless, I am not surprised by Martha Coakley's loss in that Massachusetts special election to fill the seat formerly occupied by the late US Senator Ted Kennedy. Rule Number One in politics is: NEVER take anything for granted. The Democrats, at both state and national levels, forgot that. Senator-elect Scott Brown did not. While I find him and his views on the issues of the day odious [let's just say that Keith Olbermann is right and leave it at that.--Ed.], I have to give Brown credit for his political savvy. So far.

(4) My disappointment in former US Senator (and erstwhile Vice Presidential nominee and Presidential candidate) John Edwards is now at 100%. I heard on the news this morning that he finally 'fessed up to being the father of the child that his videographer had in 2008. Way too late and several billion dollars too short, sir. You had an eloquent, effective, and persuasive voice on the twin issues of health care reform and poverty in this nation, and you squandered all of it for the sake of your ego and what you couldn't keep in your own pants. Now that voice has been silenced, and the good you could have done, especially in the wake of Ted Kennedy's death, is squelched. Not to mention the fact that your newly-acknowledged daughter is going to have to grow up knowing her own father denied her for the first two years of her life. Way to go, Daddy-o, she said, sarcasm spewing from her lips.

(5) I'm all for Rush Limbaugh continuing to rant his rabies-froth-tinged rants against all relief efforts to Haiti and against the Haitian people. Maybe he's finally stepped over a line even the tea-baggers and ditto-heads won't cross, and made his racism and selfishness and inhumanity so blatant that even those idiots will no longer follow him. So if his ravings on this subject finally break his apparent stranglehold on the GOP, all to the good. Anything that will contribute to a return to the politics of "we can agree to disagree, but we are going to work together to move the country forward" is a wonderful thing. This petulant, childish, and immature "if I can't have it 100% my own way, I'm picking up my ball and going home" approach to the nation's business must stop, before we find America relegated to irrelevance--or worse--by the rest of the world.

Monday, January 04, 2010

Bah! Humbug!



Random thoughts on the passing scene for this shiny brand-new year:

2010 is NOT the first year of the new decade. It is the LAST year of the old decade. How do I know this? Reason the first: our calendar has no "Year Zero." We go straight from 1 BC to 1 AD. Yes, folks, that's right: "AD," or "Anno Domine," literally "in the year of our Lord," is the year of Jesus' birth. When he wasn't yet born, it was 1 "BC" ("before Christ"). Once He was born, it instantly became 1 AD. He wasn't a year old until His first birthday, but His first appearance on this earth was the first "Anno Domine."

Reason the second: one does NOT count to ten by saying "0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9." One counts to ten by saying "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10." Note that "ten" comes at the END of the sequence, not the beginning. Note that we are now in "twenty-ten," the operative word being "ten." IT'S THE END OF THE CURRENT DECADE, NOT THE BEGINNING OF A NEW ONE.

Reason the third: Arthur C. Clarke, no intellectual slouch he, called his book "Two-Thousand-One" and not "Two-Thousand" for a very good reason. He knew that 2001 was the beginning of the new millennium, not 2000, which was, in fact, the end of the old one.

Observation the first: when did our schools get so bad at or lazy about teaching such fundamental counting techniques? And what does that mean for our desire to continue to be the world's leader in technology and scientific advancement when we can't even get something this simple correct?

Observation the second: even NPR had it wrong. All weekend, NPR shows were full of both retrospectives covering "the last decade" and speculations concerning "the new decade." When even NPR is getting it wrong, the battle has been lost. My heart breaks for the sake of the future.

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Please tell me I'm not the only person who is troubled by the underlying message of "Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer." If you're different, it's OK for everyone else to make fun of you and to ostracize you. Worse, when what makes you different turns out to be advantageous, it's OK for everyone else to use your difference for their advantage, and you're supposed to go along and be grateful that you are now an "accepted" member of the "in" crowd. Which status would be snatched away in a second if you either stopped allowing yourself to be used or if you expressed anything other than 100% gratitude for everyone else's "beneficence" towards you.

Bah! Humbug! Indeed.

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The major sport of the past 10 days (other than dancing around in relief that Nebraska is back after the Huskers shellacked the Arizona Wildcats 33-0 in the Holiday Bowl) has been taking pot-shots at snow removal crews in the Metro area. I refuse to join in. Those people worked long and hard, probably missing Christmas Day dinner with their families (amongst other important aspects of the holiday celebrations), in a monumental effort to cope with a total snowfall over the past two weeks that outpaced most entire winters since the mid-70s.

But all that people seem to be concerned about is that (1) their street wasn't plowed out at once; and (2) the snowplow crews were pushing snow back into their driveways that they'd just shoveled. I have no sympathy for them. Major arterials and emergency routes have to be opened and kept clear first; the residential neighborhoods are a lower priority. That's life. If you don't want to be plowed out last, move to a location along an emergency route. Oh . . . but then you'd be on a busy street and not off in some quiet cul-de-sac somewhere. Grow up, people. You can't have it both ways.

And by the way--your driveways would not have been plowed back in if you hadn't shoveled your snow out into the street in the first place. You don't want your driveway plowed back in after a storm? Shovel your snow up onto your yard, not out into the street. Good grief! What a bunch of whiners and moaners!

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Bad enough that Christmas decorations are now up before Halloween in many retail establishments. Bad enough that we are pummelled with TV commercials and print ads to "buy, buy, buy" as if that were the reason for the holiday season. What's worse is that everything grinds to a complete stop on Christmas Day. Christmas Day should be the beginning of the celebration, not the end of it! "The Twelve Days of Christmas" start on Christmas Day and go until Epiphany (or Twelfth Night) Eve. Not only should we do more to keep the real reasons for the season foremost in our minds and hearts, we should try to spread the joy throughout the season as it was originally designed to be. Keep your lights and decorations up and on until at least Epiphany (January 6th). Listen to Christmas music till then, too. Don't just stop, turn away, and go on to the next buying occasion, despite all the store ads now appearing for Valentine's Day candy and gifts. Please!