FACEBOOK DEBATES
JOHN LENNON THE GOD; JOHN LENNON THE MAN

Last Tuesday, October 9th, was John Lennon's birthday.  I celebrated by posting the "Instant Karma" video on facebook, which produced a pretty decent comment thread underneath, largely thanks to some poignant observations by my older brother.  Here you go, video first:



Ronald "Better recognize your brothers: everyone you meet."

I think Jesus said something to that effect, too. There's a reason I love this man.

Heather Imagine no possessions
 I wonder if you can
 No need for greed or hunger
 A brotherhood of man
 Imagine all the people sharing all the world

Ronald Of course, he also sang "Imagine there's no Heaven, easy if you try, no Hell below us, above us only sky." Not THAT much like Jesus. But they did both sport beards.

Heather And sandals!

Heather Oh, and they were both Socialists

Tara One of my favorite songs and he's one of my favorite people. Thanks, Ron!

Chris Yes, he was a genius. And my favorite wife and child abandoner. Nice touch, totally cutting Julian out of his will like that.

Heather Woah!

Chris hey, I love his music. But the John Lennon "oh, he's SO AMAZING" Cult of Personality weighs on me just a bit. You could go on for a long time about the profoundly shitty things he did to friends, family, colleagues, and business partners right up to his death. As you can for almost everyone of course. But most people also haven't been given this aura of near sainthood that has enveloped Lennon's memory. Just goes to show...don't meet your heroes.

Heather You're exactly right, Chris! It's funny, I think that all the time and don't understand it. But I never knew that about him! What a shithead! Especially doing that to his son!

Chris I hope I'm not perceived as hating on John. I really admire his career, his creativity and his music. But even though he wrote a lot of beautiful lyrics, he was a flawed human being like all of us. I was only objecting to some of those (not anyone here) who wax on at length like he was some kind of mythic, god-like figure. He was not. His life often contrasted with the ideals of his music. That should not be forgotten. It shouldn't unduly detract from his legacy, but it shouldn't be forgotten.

Chris Now, Ron, please don't post anything about Muhammad Ali, or I may get expelled from Facebook.

Heather No, Chris I totally understand. On a much different level, it's how I feel about Columbus Day. People's nostalgia takes over their brain.

Jennifer I don't think you can be a poet or an artist without being personally flawed in big ways.

Ronald Big brother, I'm definitely sympathetic. I posted something about Whitney Houston when she died that got me into a flame war with a clown. Seriously, a guy who teaches clowning to theater students tried to school me on how much everybody loves Whitney, and to observe that she didn't really do much to write home about with her obvious great talent is a mean thing to do.

Trust me, it sucks when a clown is out to get you.

But yeah, people take their celebrities too damned seriously, investing way too much in them, above and beyond any real consideration of the actual work. Really, celebrity isn't even about the work; it's about the fame, which is a sort of modern day equivalent of connecting with the gods on high at Olympus. So the New York Times said "God is Dead," but that was before Jimmy Page and Robert Plant became like Zeus doing it with mortal women.

But going further, the greatness of John Lennon is that he was seemingly trying to battle his own demons with his writing and performing, that he had a strong sense of what an asshole he was and responded, ultimately, by concocting a vision of what the world would be like if we could all get past being assholes to each other. He may not have succeeded in his personal life, but the struggle, I think, was and continues to be inspiring.

That is, it's not the man so much as what he did in the face of his own imperfections. In short, you can't really understand what John Lennon was about if you don't factor in how tortured he was, which necessarily includes what a dick he was, too. I look to that for inspiration, but not as something worth worship.

For that matter, who the hell would want to hang out with Jim Morrison in real life?

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

 Why America's Empire Never Achieves Its Goals

From AlterNet:

By all the usual measuring sticks, the U.S. should be supreme in a historically unprecedented way. And yet it couldn’t be more obvious that it’s not, that despite all the bases, elite forces, private armies, drones, aircraft carriers, wars, conflicts, strikes, interventions, and clandestine operations, despite a labyrinthine intelligence bureaucracy that never seems to stop growing and into which we pour a minimum of $80 billion a year, nothing seems to work out in an imperially satisfying way. It couldn’t be more obvious that this is not a glorious dream, but some kind of ever-expanding imperial nightmare.

This should, of course, have been self-evident since at least early 2004, less than a year after the Bush administration invaded and occupied Iraq, when the roadside bombs started to explode and the suicide bombings to mount, while the comparisons of the United States to Rome and of a prospective Pax Americana in the Greater Middle East to the Pax Romana vanished like a morning mist on a blazing day. Still, the wars against relatively small, ill-armed sets of insurgents dragged toward their dismally predictable ends. (It says the world that, after almost 11 years of war, the 2,000th U.S. military death in Afghanistan occurred at the hands of an Afghan “ally” in an “insider attack.”) In those years, Washington continued to be regularly blindsided by the unintended consequences of its military moves. Surprises -- none pleasant -- became the order of the day and victories proved vanishingly rare.

One thing seems obvious: a superpower military with unparalleled capabilities for one-way destruction no longer has the more basic ability to impose its will anywhere on the planet. Quite the opposite, U.S. military power has been remarkably discredited globally by the most pitiful of forces. From Pakistan to Honduras, just about anywhere it goes in the old colonial or neocolonial world, in those regions known in the contested Cold War era as the Third World, resistance of one unexpected sort or another arises and failure ensues in some often long-drawn-out and spectacular fashion.

More here.

It was very likely Jonathan Schell who first figured this out very shortly after the Vietnam War in his book about the Nixon administration, The Time of Illusion: a small but determined band of insurgents supported by the local population can freeze a superpower in its tracks, and no amount of fire power can stop it from happening.  That is, you can defeat a nation state's military, but you can't defeat a people that doesn't want to lose.  That's what happened in Vietnam.  That's what happened in Afghanistan, first with the British, then with the Soviets, and now with the United States.  It happened in Iraq, too, even though we continue to characterize that conflict as a victory--I suppose it is a victory if define it in terms of granting Iran a lot more hegemonic power in the region than it had before we invaded, but that's another story.  The bottom line is that, in the 21st century, gargantuan armed forces such as our own encounter diminishing returns the larger they get.  And because our military is, by far, the largest in the history of humanity, we're well into the realm of spending billions to get a dollar's worth of bang.  If even that.

The essay linked above attributes a lot of the motivation for transmuting so many of our foreign policy problems into military problems to a sort of lockstep herd mentality among the Washington establishment, you know, the old military industrial complex and its vast influence over our leaders.  But that doesn't explain why "strong military defense" continues to be a winning campaign issue, why so many rank-and-file Americans always support an ever larger military, even though we break strength and size records year after year after year, why the slightest diplomatic sleight always elicits calls for military response.  Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran.  What is it about the American culture that makes us want to pull out guns and fuck people up?  Why are we like this even when it has become mind-numbingly obvious that there are profound limits to what we can actually accomplish abroad using armed force?  When we are laying off teachers and firemen in order to channel our wealth and prosperity into a military that is designed to neutralize Nazis and Soviets even though no threat of this sort has existed for decades?

I don't really know the answer to these questions, but it is telling, I think, that our national anthem is a hymn to war and destruction, rather than an ode to democracy and freedom.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Your right to resell your own stuff is in peril

From Market Watch:

At issue in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons is the first-sale doctrine in copyright law, which allows you to buy and then sell things like electronics, books, artwork and furniture, as well as CDs and DVDs, without getting permission from the copyright holder of those products.

Under the doctrine, which the Supreme Court has recognized since 1908, you can resell your stuff without worry because the copyright holder only had control over the first sale.

Put simply, though Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has the copyright on the iPhone and Mark Owen has it on the book “No Easy Day,” you can still sell your copies to whomever you please whenever you want without retribution. 

That’s being challenged now for products that are made abroad, and if the Supreme Court upholds an appellate court ruling, it would mean that the copyright holders of anything you own that has been made in China, Japan or Europe, for example, would have to give you permission to sell it.

“It means that it’s harder for consumers to buy used products and harder for them to sell them,” said Jonathan Band, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University Law Center, who filed a friend-of-the-court brief on behalf of the American Library Association, the Association of College and Research Libraries and the Association for Research Libraries. “This has huge consumer impact on all consumer groups.” 

Another likely result is that it would hit you financially because the copyright holder would now want a piece of that sale. 

It could be your personal electronic devices or the family jewels that have been passed down from your great-grandparents who immigrated from Spain. It could be a book that was written by an American writer but printed and bound overseas, or an Italian painter’s artwork.

More here.

Longish excerpt, I know, but it's a slightly abstract concept that needs more than just a few words to explain.  Needless, to say, given what's at stake, it's also an important concept.

Since the passage of NAFTA, and even a bit earlier, observers on the left have been noting that "free trade" has a lot less to do with free trade than it does with investor agreements and patent and copyright protections.  That is, a not insignificant chunk of the drive to reduce trade barriers and tariffs includes locking in, within an international legal framework, the ability of wealthy elites to make money at the expense of everybody else: the case described above is just about as clear-cut of an example of this as I've ever seen.

Indeed, the very concept of owning something that you have bought and paid for is now on the chopping block, and I'd give the now corporate-friendly US Supreme Court a better than fifty-fifty chance for upholding the lower court ruling.  It is very important to note that in our now global economy a great deal of what we buy was manufactured outside our borders.  Consequently, this would result in heavily restricted trade, rather than the "free trade" such an idea ostensibly represents.  It only helps massive corporations: small businesses, savvy entrepreneurs, thrifty teenagers, and people like you and me just trying to make a buck need not apply.  So bye-bye, pawn shops.  So long, used car lots.  Later days, used book stores.  Hasta la vista, e-Bay.

It's clear how this helps out the extremely wealthy.  What's not clear is how this does anything but beat up on an already fragile economy.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

The Unbelievable Ways Schools Are Now Monitoring Children -- Even What They're Eating

From AlterNet:

Schools across the country are adopting a variety of different tools to monitor students both in school and outside school. Among these tools are RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) tags embedded in school ID cards, GPS tracking software in computers, and even CCTV video camera systems. According to school authorities, these tools are being adopted not to simply increase security, but to prevent truancy, cut down on theft and even improve students' eating habits.

And

San Antonio is taking its cue from the Houston, TX, school district. It began using RFID chips to monitor students on 13 campuses in 2004. Houston’s Spring Independent School District gave 28,000 students RFID badges to record when they get on and off school buses. The police and school administrators provided the badges to ostensibly prevent truancy and child abductions. In 2010, the school reported, “RFID readers situated throughout each campus are used to identify where students are located in the building, which can be used to verify the student’s attendance for ADA funding and course credit purposes.” Student tracking has reportedly brought them hundreds of thousands of extra dollars.

More here.

This is disturbing on multiple levels and for multiple reasons.  It is a gross violation of privacy.  At its root, it's financially driven, but plays into fear mongering about "security" issues, serving to make Americans even more irrational than they already are on the subject.  It is highly prone to abuse by school officials and the businesses involved in setting this shit up.  It's just plain creepy and sinister.  And it's widespread, all over the country, and coming to a school district near you, if it's not already there.

But what's truly disturbing about this, to me, is that it will condition young Americans to accept the surveillance state as a normal part of life.  That is, in the same way that public school culture conditions children to trust the experts, to leave major decisions about society to people in positions of power, to obey authority simply because it is authority, you know, the most well-learned lessons students experience because they go through the drill every day for thirteen years, hyper-surveillance in schools will make American culture more accepting of Big Brother watching us every minute of every day.

This can't end well.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Congressman calls evolution lie from 'pit of hell'

From the AP via the Houston Chronicle:

Georgia Rep. Paul Broun said in videotaped remarks that evolution, embryology and the Big Bang theory are "lies straight from the pit of hell" meant to convince people that they do not need a savior.

The Republican lawmaker made those comments during a speech Sept. 27 at a sportsman's banquet at Liberty Baptist Church in Hartwell. Broun, a medical doctor, is running for re-election in November unopposed by Democrats.

"God's word is true," Broun said, according to a video posted on the church's website. "I've come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and Big Bang theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of hell. And it's lies to try to keep me and all the folks who are taught that from understanding that they need a savior."

More here.

A couple of weeks ago I was writing about how I don't understand the penchant for many fundamentalist Christians to elevate, by way of repetition and emphasis, homosexuality above and beyond all other sins.  This week, actually for many years at this point, I'm not understanding the fundamentalist urge to pit evolution against creationism.

The problem, as I see it, is that declaring one or the other to be the correct understanding of reality is like bringing apples and oranges to a gun fight.  That is, the two points of view come out of radically different philosophical systems; it makes complete sense that different approaches to knowledge would reach different conclusions about the nature of the universe.

Science, of course, as a foundational assumption, limits its view of reality to that which can be verifiably observed.  Creationism, the American fundamentalist Christian version of it, at any rate, on the other hand, assumes that all important information about the nature of reality is contained within the Bible.  And I don't say this in any way to denigrate creationists: theology is a branch of the overall philosophical point of view known as metaphysics, which often attempts to understand, in a rational way, that which cannot necessarily be seen.  Science once existed underneath the metaphysics umbrella, but pulled away once it embraced super-empiricism as a ruling ethic.  But metaphysics continued as a philosophical field, and is legitimate if only because intensely intelligent people over the centuries have continued to work in the metaphysical tradition.

I mean, you can argue science versus metaphysics, and countless philosophers have done so for many years.  But to put scientific conclusions in contention with metaphysical conclusions, without first addressing the fact that humanity has arrived at those conclusions using totally variant systems of knowledge, just makes no sense at all.  That's why "teaching the controversy" about evolution in a biology class misses the point entirely: in science, there is no controversy.  Consequently, the "controversy" is inappropriate for a science class.  Philosophy class, yes.  Comparative religion class, sure thing.  Social studies, you bet.  But not science.  Teaching creationism in a science class is like teaching ballet in an auto mechanics class.  Just a really bad idea.

Time and again, however, fundamentalist Christians inexplicably feel like they need to gird themselves in the armor of God and do rhetorical battle with the heathens of science, never seeming to realize that going toe to toe with the scientific method is a non sequitur.  Again, this is not to trash creationists.  They may very well be right when all is said and done.  I don't know.  Indeed, as Hamlet said, "There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,than are dreamt of in your philosophy."  I mean, that's the whole point of metaphysics, after all.  But when scientists say that this is what the physical evidence appears to indicate, they've definitely got a point.  To counter with something like "the Bible says differently" cannot possibly erase the conclusions of science; rather, from a metaphysical point of view, one must say that there is likely more going on than meets the eye, while granting what the eye actually sees.

Or something to that effect.

So why is all this so important?  When science is trashed so often and so consistently, it serves to undermine our culture's belief in the importance of science, which leads to less funding and less learning.  Whether you're a creationist or not, I think we can all agree that science, as a philosophy for understanding physical reality, has accomplished many great and wondrous things for the human race.  Now is not the time to go backward as far as science is concerned.

But here we have sitting members of the US Congress calling science a lie "from the pit of hell."  That is, to embrace science is to be in league with Satan.  Things are getting worse, folks.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

THE STAR TREK CALENDAR PICTURE OF THE MONTH IS...

...Spock and Kirk!

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FRIDAY CAT BLOGGING

Sammy

Be sure to check out Modulator's Friday Ark for more cat blogging pics!

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

DEBATE SCHMEBATE, LISTEN TO ME AND MATT RANT AND RAVE IN A PODCAST!

This was waiting for me on my facebook "timeline" Wednesday night after I got home from work:

Come on Ron! I'm waiting to hear your take on the debate!

Here's my response:

I haven't watched a presidential debate in over a decade. Generally, they drive me batty. They never address the issues I want to hear about. They're always in a format that allows lots of off-topic rambling. They're not even really debates; more like dueling speeches. Moderators always allow candidates to use maximum bullshit. And, as a former high school debater, this crap is just insulting to my intelligence usually. Indeed, "winning" is always in terms of "character" or how the pundits assert that the candidates are perceived by the public. It's all crap.

Now having said that, I did glance at a quickie reaction on a liberal site, and my understanding is that Obama was "lackluster" or some such, which, even though that's a vague and meaningless criticism, is a bit disappointing to me: I've always wanted him to be a fighter, for which our toxic politics really calls these days, but he's just not that, so I shouldn't be surprised.

Here's the article I read:

http://www.alternet.org/presidential-debate-obama-had-no-chutzpah-and-why-didnt-he-confront-romneys-blatant-dishonesty-more 

So I'm not even going to talk about the Obamny media event called a "debate."  Instead, I'm going to offer the latest installment of the Warzone Radio, hosted by my former student Matt.  I join in around 1:35:00 or so.  We mostly talk about Romney's 47% remarks, but, of course, we also drift far and wide.  Fun stuff.

Click here for the show.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FROM THE REAL ART SPORTS DESK
TEXAS BEATS OKLAHOMA STATE ON THE ROAD;
LSU SLUGGISH AGAINST DIVISION II TEAM

From the AP via ESPN:

No. 3 LSU overcomes slow start, beats FCS school Towson

Zach Mettenberger's perfectly placed 53-yard scoring strike to Odell Beckham Jr. exemplified the type of play Les Miles wanted to see from LSU's offense before the Tigers hit one of the toughest stretches on their schedule.

If only that play had been the norm instead of the exception in a mistake-filled outing, Miles might not have been describing a "somber locker room" following No. 3 LSU's 38-22 victory over Towson on Saturday night.

"It was just sloppy play," Mettenberger said. "We have been sloppy week in and week out. We have to clean it up. Right now we are not playing LSU football. I'm very disappointed in myself and the team right now."

More here.

Again from the AP via ESPN:

Joe Bergeron's late TD run leads Texas past Oklahoma State

The reasons to doubt David Ash continue to vanish as he keeps finding ways to lead No. 12 Texas to victory.

Ash threw three touchdown passes to Jaxon Shipley and set up Joe Bergeron's 2-yard touchdown run with 29 seconds left in the Longhorns' 41-36 victory over Oklahoma State on Saturday night.

Ash led Texas (4-0, 1-0 Big 12) on a 75-yard scoring drive after the Cowboys (2-2, 0-1) took the lead on Quinn Sharp's 24-yard field goal with 2:34 to play.

More here.

Needless to say, I missed last week's report from the Real Art Sports Desk.  I guess I've been so caught up in cross-posting between here and fb, and having fun with all the debating there, that I just forgot until late Friday night, and by that time I was, like, "new games tomorrow; I'll just skip it."  Suffice it to say that LSU edged Auburn, at Auburn, 12-10, in a defensive thriller, while Texas blew out Ole Miss 66-31 in a Lone Star salute to to the old South.  But that was last week.

This week, Texas continued to impress, winning what is almost always an exciting match with OSU.  Indeed, even though the Cowboys aren't ranked, the Longhorns beat them on the road, showing that they know how to keep their shit when they're behind.  I mean, it wasn't perfect.  Oklahoma State moved the ball almost at will, which means we need to get it together on defense.  But then the Cowboys seem almost always to move the ball at will, on almost everybody they play, so maybe I'm being too harsh.  Texas did, in fact, go on the road and beat a tough Big 12 team on their home field.  And Ash really is looking damned good.  My hopes are definitely up after seeing this one.

LSU, however, has diminished my hopes, and even made me reevaluate what I thought was a good win last week against  the other Tigers.  I didn't get to see this Towsen game, but I didn't need to.  They should have totally routed their opponent, but didn't, and that's pretty much all you need to know.  Catching the game reports while I watched the Texas game made me think "sloppy," and it's not surprising to hear Mettenberger use the same word.  Indeed, sloppy play has been something of an ear mark of the Les Miles era--remember their last national championship season with multiple instances of absolute chaos on the field?  Maybe I should mellow out and not worry; they've been here before, and may very well pull off the big one once again.

But looking so lame against such an inferior opponent doesn't fill me with confidence, either.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

GOP "LEGITIMATE RAPE" GUY SHOVES OTHER FOOT IN MOUTH

From the Huffington Post:

Rep. Todd Akin (R-Mo.), the Senate candidate that drew criticism in August after making the inaccurate claim that the victims of "legitimate rape" can force their bodies to avoid pregnancy, also believes it's fair for employers to pay women less than men.

"I believe in free enterprise. I don't think the government should be telling people what you pay and what you don't pay," Akin said at a town hall meeting on Thursday. The comment came in response to a question about Akin's decision to vote against the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, which has made it it easier for women to challenge unequal pay.

More here.

As Rachel Maddow observed Monday night, this is along the lines of Rand Paul's "freedom" that would allow racist hotel and restaurant owners to deny service to black people.  That is, it's that weird libertarian "freedom" that's more oppression than anything else: it's my business, and I'm paying you with my money, so I can pay you whatever I damn well please.  Yeah, as I've observed before, libertarian "freedom" is philosophically supported by that truism well known to three-year-olds and assholes everywhere, the philosophy of "it's mine!"  Some philosophy.

Of course, when you put this stance together with Akin's "legitimate rape" point of view, it sure does make him out to be a major sexist piece of shit, libertarian views or not.  Actually, even if you don't consider his "legitimate rape" bullshit, it still makes him out to be a sexist piece of shit, just as Rand Paul's libertarian stance on race and public accommodations makes him out to be a racist piece of shit.  It doesn't matter how you get there.  In the end, sexism and racism are exactly that, sexism and racism.

On the other hand, you've got to give Akin credit for being forthright about his views.  Back in the day, conservatives would offer this crap wrapped up in vague rhetoric with a few code words such that they could plausibly deny their misogyny or racism while letting their intended constituencies understand exactly where they stood.  Indeed, this newly found Republican honesty may very well end up being the biggest factor in an Obama victory next month.

So keep talking, conservatives.  It's good for the country.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FACEBOOK DEBATES
DEBATING THE POOR

My old buddy Matt, a highly intelligent, ethical, right-leaning moderate inspires me to lots of wordage on a facebook thread for this Real Art post I recycled on the social network:

Matt Seriously, we're talking about Americans enduring that uniquely American version of poverty where you have a color TV and are stressed about which medical treatments you can afford that the rest of the world doesn't even have access to? I'm not putting it down but seriously we're not talking about Americans suddenly living in Brazil-like slums, just not having line workers in factory making $100k+ a year. I know I sound tongue in cheek but this is a serious question. In addition, what if the policies needed to shore up our lower class impinge on our innovation as an economy which usually raises the living standard globally?

Ronald "Americans enduring that uniquely American version of poverty where you have a color TV and are stressed about which medical treatments you can afford that the rest of the world doesn't even have access to"

We should be more specific about what this means. A 2009 Harvard study found that 45,000 Americans die every year due to lack of access to health care:

http://www.pnhp.org/news/2009/september/harvard_study_finds_.php

Obamacare will, of course, start to kick in for real over the next few years, but I'm not filled with hope--indeed, the president's health care overhaul has been likened to trying to solve the homeless problem by requiring people to buy houses. But I guess we'll see.

It's also important to point out that those color televisions are relatively cheap, within the reach of McDonald's burger flippers. Electronic gadgets produced in mass quantity are, in any case, a very poor way to judge quality of life. Think of it this way: my life was just awful, but then I bought a nice television, and now it's fine. Just doesn't work that way. Further, and this notion comes in direct response to conservative arguments about defending the shift from good unionized jobs to shitty service sector jobs, inexpensive consumer goods are a pretty bad tradeoff for low wages and no benefits. That is, Walmart's low prices have not come even close to solving the problem that its employment policies helped to create.

The real financial problems facing the poor, and increasingly people who only a couple of years ago thought of themselves as middle class, are the soaring cost of health care and the ever increasing cost of housing--indeed, a quarter of a century ago, housing, on average, took up some twenty five percent of an individual or family's income; today it eats up nearly half. Cheap TV's, video games, low, low, low prices at Walmart, none of it pays the rent or provides health insurance; conversely, foregoing the cheap gadgets won't save nearly enough money to do the trick. So, yeah, it's nice to have television, which, in the end, isn't much more than a sophisticated marketing device, anyway, but this just has nothing to do with keeping a roof over your head or being able to get your appendix out if it's killing you.

So I think that the "our poor are much better off than their poor" argument, one I've been hearing for years, is much less of an argument than it is an attempt at justifying predatory economic policy that ever squeezes the poor and middle class. Actually, it's not an argument at all, in that it ignores and sweeps the most important issues under the rug. Forty five thousand deaths a year is significant. And "our poor don't live in shacks without running water on the outskirts of Sao Paulo" is setting an extraordinarily low bar. We can and ought to do better.

But all of the above is just a warmup.

Ronald "In addition, what if the policies needed to shore up our lower class impinge on our innovation as an economy which usually raises the living standard globally?"

In fact, it's the reverse. Current economic policy clearly serves to choke economic innovation.

As you know, I've gone through the secondary education certification process in Texas. This opened up some new worlds of thought for me, cognitive and educational psychology, sociology, issues associated with poverty, ethnic and racial diversity, and the like. In what was a mostly dull curriculum, these topics stood out because they're particularly interesting, which is why I've kind of kept up with them in my internet reading since then. So when I say that the entire public discourse on education right now - teacher unions protecting "bad" teachers, attempts to quantify educational outcomes solely in terms of standardized tests, charter schools, vouchers, school choice, and on and on - is almost totally misguided, understand that I'm coming from a point of view supported by reams and reams of actual data and research, support which, unfortunately, doesn't appear to have much bearing on the political debate.

That is, if you remove from consideration schools serving students living in or near poverty, American schools are, by multiple standards, among the best in the world. In short, it's not a bad teacher problem, not a rigid government organizational structure problem, not a "choice" problem: it's a poverty problem, plain and simple.

And this makes complete sense in terms of my own studies. When you characterize American poverty as being not so bad, you're ignoring a host of issues that greatly complicate your position. Living in poverty means dealing with all the problems it creates. If you're poor, you're probably living in a bad neighborhood, where just making it to the school building is dangerous. There are gangs. Drugs are omnipresent. There's a good chance that your parents, or single parent as the case often is, are suffering from some kind of dysfunctionality, like drug addiction, or other destructive behaviors. That means there's a very good chance that your parents are playing no role whatsoever in your educational life. That also means that survival must necessarily take priority over education. Survival often means joining a gang. Survival often means selling drugs. Or it means working the graveyard shift at Burger King and then just trying to stay awake all day in school. If you managed to make it that day. In short, even though a small few manage to find educational success with the deck stacked against them in this way, the vast majority just can't. It's too much. The school system assumes that students have a relatively healthy home life. That they are well fed, rested, psychologically well adjusted, and ready to learn. That school is their most important focus.

In other words, the schools operate on assumptions that simply aren't true for kids coming from poverty. So we create an entire class of people who begin life with an intellectual disadvantage.

But wait. It gets better. And by "better," I mean "worse."

Current neuroscience is now physically verifying what psychologists have asserted for years: the developmental process for the brains of children is extremely sensitive to environmental factors. An addiction specialist whose work I've read, Gabor Mate, puts it like this. Most mammals' brains develop in vitro. That's why you see colts starting to gallop within only a few hours of birth. Humans, however, end up with relatively enormous brains inside relatively enormous heads. In order to get those heads outside the uterus, we are all, compared to other mammals, born prematurely. Consequently, a great deal of brain development that would otherwise have occurred in the safe space of the womb happens out in the open, in the big bad world. That's why, in addition to simple moral reasons, children must be protected and nurtured until they are grown up. To do otherwise is to literally damage the process of brain development.

You see where I'm going with this? Even though children from affluent backgrounds can have their heads fucked up by their family experiences, this is totally rare when compared to what happens to children at ground zero in the struggle to survive conditions of poverty. That is, poverty alters brain development in bad ways. And this is a now established fact.

So. The schools are simply not set up to serve children in poverty. And poverty fucks up brain development. An easy conclusion to make is that we, as a nation, are simply not serious about the concept of "equal opportunity." If we were, we'd be doing something about poverty, but we're not. We treat it as an economic condition rather than the human condition it actually is. And the entire train of thought I've gone through above is not a part of the national discussion on economics, education, or anything. We like to keep the poor out of sight and out of mind, where their pesky reality won't impinge on people making lots of money.

And that takes me back to your question about poverty eradication standing in the way of economic growth. To make a joke of "equal opportunity" the way we have is tantamount to robbing large groups of our population from ever having the ability to make an economic contribution. How many scientists have we lost in this way? How many potential entrepreneurs? How many writers, businessmen, lawyers, accountants have we flushed down the toilet? US economic policy quashes huge amounts of economic potential, simply by quashing huge amounts of human potential.

Ordinarily, I would not expect what I've written to be terribly persuasive to anybody who strongly supports laissez faire capitalism, but Matt's a different story.  Like I said, he's really smart, and is definitely open to new ideas.  A sort of old school conservative who thinks the left might very well be onto something from time to time.  I await his response.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

RESPONDING TO A CONSERVATIVE NUT

It appears that one of my classmates from high school turned out to be a conservative nut.  No surprise there, really, given that we both come from a Texas suburb, but facebook has got everybody all talking to each other these days, and so we're hearing much more nuttery than we ordinarily would have. 

It was in the context of the post I made here at Real Art last week, which I immediately re-formatted to post on facebook, the one meditating on the meaning of Joel Osteen declaring that he didn't choose to be straight.  I've already turned one of the comment exchanges into another post here.  Indeed, the fb comment thread ended up with a whopping 110 comments, lots of good debate, and pretty darned civilized and constructive, for the most part.

Which brings me back to my nutty high school chum.  His comment, I think, was not constructive.  But it was such a good and rousing discussion that I was confronted with something of a dilemma.  Under different circumstances, I might have simply lambasted him, or ignored him, or even deleted his comment if it was foul enough.  But I've got this talk-to-conservatives project running on facebook, and the big gay Christian debate was succeeding really well.  What to do?

Check it out:

Mike I have a couple of quick points on this you might be interested in, first off gay or straight I refuse to let others dictate to me what I should think about this topic, and to be perfectly honest, I believe what I want to believe. What others choose to believe is their business and as long as they don't try to shove it down my throat (or grab my package) I don't have a problem with them. Problem is, everyone is trying their hardest to crucify the Christian right for their views on the topic, and by being so militant about their beliefs and how I should agree with them they become the antithesis of the exact point of view they are espousing... tolerance for all. So I'm just gonna sit back here on the sideline, take another shot of tequilla (Tres Generationes Plata to be exact) and watch the show. Don't tell me what to believe or what to think. Ron you come off as at least a semi well educated person, and isn't the whole purpose of education to teach people how to think for themselves??? or is this just another concept that has been lost to our society these days? in the end, I'll sum it up for you: 1. EVERYONE is entitled to their own opinion, regardless of how silly it may seem to you (see flying spaghetti monster: if you don't get it, then use google). 2. Trying to force me to accept your point of view as anything more than a valid perspective is fruitless. My point of view is just as valid as yours and in my eyes even more so. 3. in conclusion it doesn't matter what Joel Osteen believes and it doesn't matter what the LGBT organizations believe, yet from an outsiders perspective they are equally as bad for society in their practices, only the methods differ.

Ronald Mike, with all due respect, I don't really understand your comment. I mean, I understand parts of it, but other parts truly baffle me. For instance, are you characterizing my essay above as an attempt "to crucify the Christian right"? If so, you should hear what I have to say when I take the gloves off; for me, I feel like I was being extraordinarily respectful. Perhaps you were talking about somebody else, but I'm not sure who.

Also, I'm not entirely sure, but were you calling for people to tolerate the intolerant? It seems like championing the notion of tolerance, by its very nature, necessarily includes condemnation of intolerance. But then, that wasn't really the thrust of my essay above, so, again, I'm confused.

Also, I may be misreading your words, but it sounds like you're telling me that free thought means people shouldn't discuss their opinions. Personally, I don't see how there can be such a thing as free thought without discussion. That is, in order to truly understand what one believes, it is absolutely necessary to understand what others believe, and discussion, along with reading, is the only way to do that. Further, it appears to me, and, again, I might just be misunderstanding, that you're confusing persuasion with force. Persuasion is when you try to convince someone to do or believe something. Force is when you make someone do or believe something. And the entire democratic system that we as Americans embrace, is, in a very real sense, founded on the notion of persuasion, rather than force.

Finally, I am very much of the opinion that words and beliefs matter. I am very much of the opinion that there is such a thing as morality, as right and wrong, in the universe we inhabit. The trick, of course, is understanding the difference between right and wrong, and that's often not easy to do: only through discussion and shared thought can we arrive at the truth. But, of course, I do agree that everyone is entitled to their opinions. On the other hand, people can be, and often are, mistaken in their assumptions that inform those opinions. In short, some opinions are, indeed, more valid than others.

Be rational. Be respectful. And don't get caught up in the nut's bullshit. That means rejecting his narrative and offering your own in its place; I mean, acknowledge his narrative, but make it dead on arrival.  I think this is an effective approach, at least, in terms of persuading people who are observing the exchange--nuts, after all, can't be persuaded of anything.  On the other hand, his lack of response after my comment may mean that I got to him.  Or it just might mean that I pissed him off.  Hard to tell.  He hasn't come out to play again.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

QUIS CUSTODIET IPSOS CUSTODES
Means "Who Polices the Police?"

From CounterPunch:

The Big Lie About Police Brutality

Police brutality is in the news, thanks to the widespread availability of amateur video and the omnipresence of security cameras.

We’ve seen scene after scene of police beating the crap out of, and even shooting and killing unarmed or minimally dangerous students, women, old men and crazy people, many of them after they have been handcuffed and checked for weapons.

The police brass, and leading politicians who oversee the departments involved, nearly always have the same answer: This is not the norm, these are isolated incidents, police violence is not on the rise. Rarely is an abusive or murderous officer punished or even administratively disciplined for documented crimes.

And

The thing we need to all recognize is that these videos are just the incidents that have been captured on video. They clearly reflect something that is going on all the time, usually without any video to record it, or often even without any eye witnesses.

And

There are plenty of good cops who take their work seriously, and do their job properly, but as some of those cops have told me themselves, there are also way too many who are just thugs in uniforms, and there are precious few chiefs of police, few district attorneys, and few mayors who have the political courage (exhibited by Chief Simmons in the Florida case above) to take them on, to punish abusive behavior and to demand that policing be about “protecting and serving,” and not about brutalizing those who are being confronted for alleged law-breaking.

More here.

Hey!  This guy sounds just like me!

So much so, in fact, right down to the usual caveat about how "there are plenty of good cops," that I'd be wondering if he'd been reading my stuff here at Real Art over the years, if the phenomenon wasn't so damned obvious.  That is, the writer excerpted above is simply verifying independently what I've been saying for a very long time: we have a crises of police brutality, corruption, and general misbehavior all across the United States, and nobody in power really appears to give a shit about it.

For that matter, the public doesn't seem to give a shit about it either--okay, white people don't give a shit; people of color, I think, especially African-Americans, who receive the lion's share of police misbehavior, do give a shit, but it's a sort of "it is what it is" kind of thing.  So it's the status quo, and there's just no momentum toward cleaning it all up.

Here's some of the reason why.  A friend of mine on facebook, a socialist with whom I attended high school, posted something about cop misbehavior last week, and I chimed in with a comment in agreement.  But I stopped for a moment to wonder what the reaction might be from other facebook friends reading it.  Damn the torpedoes, of course, I'll say what I want if it's the truth.  The fact that we are so conditioned to think of cops as always being the "good guys," however, is a very strong social imperative: people are immediately skeptical when one calls into question one of the bedrock institutions of society.

We need more movies like Serpico.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FRIDAY CAT BLOGGING

Sammy

Be sure to check out Modulator's Friday Ark for more cat blogging pics!

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

Texas AG offers to help school district in battle over religious banners 

From the Houston Chronicle:

A Southeast Texas school district criticized when cheerleaders put Bible verses on high school football game banners will get help from the state, if they want it, should a civil suit be filed.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott on Thursday sent a letter to the Kountze Independent School District, offering to help the district and the cheerleaders and said that the banners do not violate First Amendment rights, as opponents contend.

In a letter sent to district Superintendant Kevin Weldon, Abbott said that a communication the district received last week from the Freedom From Religion Foundation about the banners was "menacing and misleading." He said based on news reports he has read, the signs were student-initiated and used no school funds, and therefore should be protected under free exercise of religion.

More here.

As always, I'm very dubious about the concept of religious proselytizing in public schools being "student initiated": I strongly recall the "student initiated" prayer at my high school graduation, for which I was privy to the planning meetings; "student initiated" meant an administrator saying, "and this is the point at which Andrea gives the invocation."  That is, there's often some kind of district employee behind it all, especially for really big events like football games and graduations, and that's a clear cut violation of the first amendment's establishment clause.  Having said that, there is, indeed, such a thing as student initiated religious expression, and that should not be suppressed.  Indeed, to do so would be a clear cut violation of the first amendment's free exercise clause.

Yeah, I know, it gets a bit confusing, but only when you tune out and stop paying attention.  That is, this stuff isn't rocket science.  Citizens have the right to freely exercise their religion, but the government cannot do anything that is tantamount to establishing an official religion.  That's why teachers can't lead students in prayer, but also why students must be allowed to pray independently.  See?  Not so complicated, after all.

But this thing about "student initiated" religious cheerleader banners at school football games pushes the envelope.  Even if students came up with the idea totally on their own, it's in a weird realm that, to all appearances, says to all in attendance that the school supports a particular religious point of view.  Everybody involved, the cheerleaders, and the football players who run through the banners as they enter the field of play, are wearing official school uniforms.  The usage of the banners is during an official school function, in front of an audience.  Indeed, the conventional wisdom for high school football games is that, when you wear your school's colors and present yourself in front of the public, you are representing your school, and want to give the best impression possible.  In that light, the "best impression" must necessarily be that such a school is religious, officially religious, and that Christianity is the official religion.

If it looks, sounds, and walks like a duck, it very likely is a duck.  I guess a good test would be to ask how "student initiated" messages of atheism or Islam on these banners would be accepted: I think everybody with half a brain already knows the answer to such a question, but it would be fun to see how district administrators squirm while they spin their response.

At any rate, this is probably dead on arrival as far as the law is concerned, given, as the article observes, precedent that has already outlawed prayers over the loudspeakers at public high school football games.  That means the Texas AG wants to waste taxpayer money chasing a wild goose.  And that's all par for the course in my home state.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FULL COURT PRESS

From CounterPunch:

Upward Redistribution

Almost all of this discussion has focused narrowly on what the government actually takes from people in tax revenue and what it pays out in Social Security, unemployment insurance, and other benefits. This is unfortunate, because tax and transfer policy is the less important way in which the government helps or harms people.

And

We have also strengthened patent and copyright laws to make the monopolies granted stronger and longer. Currently we spend $300 billion a year on prescription drugs. If drugs were sold in a competitive market, we would save around $270 billion annually. This transfer from consumers to drug companies is about five times as large as the size of the Bush tax cuts to the richest 2 percent.

Labor-management policy is another important area through which the government redistributes income. In the last three decades this policy has been much more friendly to management and hostile to workers. For example, in the Chicago teacher strike, Mayor Rahm Emanuel had gone to court and threatened strike leaders with fines and imprisonment if they did not end their strike.

More here.

Quite right.  It's not just the taxes.  Indeed, it's a full court press on working Americans, all to the benefit of that now controversial group that owns and operates the nation, that one percent of the top one percent, the filthy, filthy rich.  When the government is literally your plaything, you can rig almost the entire economy so as to fill your already full pockets.  Without the enforcement of already existing labor law, businesses can play the so-called "labor market" in countless ways, including pulling up stakes and moving to greener pastures when it looks like workers are thinking about unionizing, which is totally illegal, and on and on.  For that matter, increasing the minimum wage, which is now paying an adjusted for inflation rate equivalent to what workers were getting in 1960s, is dead on arrival when the plutocracy owns Congress.  It's taken decades since this started when Reagan took office, but we now live in an economy that has been structured of, by, and for the fabulously wealthy.

Of course, the justification has always been that "a rising tide lifts all the boats."  But I think it's now safe to say, beyond any doubt at all, that the rich have figured out how to make it such that only their boats rise.  Meanwhile, everybody else's boats just sink.  Why don't people understand this?

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FUCKING THE ECONOMY FOR YEARS AT A TIME HAS BIG CONSEQUENCES

From AlterNet:

Life Expectancy Decreases by 4 Years Among Poor Whites in U.S.

Yesterday, the New York Times reported on an alarming new study: researchers have documented that the least educated white Americans are experiencing sharp declines in life expectancy. Between 1990 and 2008, white women without a high school diploma lost a full five years of their lives, while their male counterparts lost three years. Experts say that declines in life expectancy in developed countries are exceedingly rare, and that in the U.S., decreases on this scale "have not been seen in the U.S. since the Spanish influenza epidemic of 1918." Even during the Great Depression, which wrought economic devastation and severe psychic trauma for millions of Americans, average life expectancy was on the increase.

More here.  

Again from AlterNet:

Suicide Overtakes Car Accidents As Leading Cause of Death

But there is strong evidence elsewhere that our disastrous economy may be playing a significant role. Last year, a report by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention found that “[s]uicide rates in the U.S. tend to rise during recessions and fall amid economic booms.” 

In Europe, a recent wave of “suicides by economic crisis” has been well-documented, as these shocking statistics attest:

In Greece, the suicide rate among men increased more than 24 percent from 2007 to 2009, government statistics show. In Ireland during the same period, suicides among men rose more than 16 percent. In Italy, suicides motivated by economic difficulties have increased 52 percent, to 187 in 2010 — the most recent year for which statistics were available — from 123 in 2005.

More here.

You know, I've argued a lot against libertarianism, Ann Rand's objectivist swill, neoliberalism, and the like.  I've written extensively over the years in order to illustrate how, exactly, these points of view ultimately hurt most of the people who think these ideas are the path to prosperity.  But, in the end, it all comes down to the horrifying world that must necessarily result from every-man-for-himself attitudes.  Lonely, brutish, backstabbing, hateful, grief-stricken, painful.  That's the civilization, if you want to call it that, the Ann Rand cultists would have us embrace.  We're well on the way down that road right now.  Every fiber of my very being screams out against this.  And if you have an ounce of human soul within you, you're screaming, too.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

FACEBOOK DEBATES
HOW SHOULD WE DEBATE RELIGION IN THE PUBLIC SPHERE?

I've taken to putting some of what I consider to be my better posts onto facebook for people to read.  It took awhile for me to get around to this, but longer posts from guys like science fiction writer David Gerrold and others I admire gave me the courage to do so.  And I've had some very good results so far, lots of discussion, lots of opportunity for me and others to refine and articulate our views.  I'm also very slowly learning how to talk to conservatives, and be heard, about controversial topics.  Not an easy task, but I think it can be done.

So I posted last night's Real Art entry on the social network right after I posted it here, and a fabulous discussion ensued.  But there was one comment that forced me to think for a while before responding:

Susan You have a lot of free time.

My initial reaction was to return snark for snark, to say something like, "No, it's just that I don't waste a lot of time watching television," or "You think reading and writing about the important issues of the day is a pastime?"  But I went to high school with Susan.  She is, or at least was back in the day, not much of a debater, and it was significant, I think, that she took the time to comment at all.  So I waited a few hours and thought about it.

Here's what ensued:

Ronald @Susan: Oh, come now, Susan, you should join the discussion! This is an important topic!

Susan OK Ron.. My only comment is this: I hate to see anyone criticize religion and reject it because of what someone else is doing in the name of religion. Maybe that isn't as profound as some of the other debaters, but to me, it just sounds like a reason to not be religious and not go to church. It is hard not to judge fellow Christians (I think I do it every day in some form or fashion), but we should all try to be true to ourselves while trying to please God. This is what I believe.

Ronald @Susan: Thank you for participating in the conversation. Of course, I have a response:

"Maybe that isn't as profound as some of the other debaters"

Your thoughts are legitimate simply because they're your thoughts, and I welcome your articulating them. After all, our democracy cannot exist without citizens participating in the "marketplace of ideas." So whether you think you can hang with people who argue all the time is irrelevant; you're doing your patriotic duty by joining the talk.

That is, discussing the important issues of the day isn't simply something an American does when he has "too much time on his hands;" rather, it's something Americans must do every day, or the country just doesn't function the way it ought to. I think the mediocre field of candidates with which we all have to contend year after year is testament to the fact that we, as a people, no longer fulfill this duty of citizenship.

And that kind of leads me into my second point.

"I hate to see anyone criticize religion and reject it because of what someone else is doing in the name of religion."

The old adage is that one should never talk politics or religion. But I think that's more about cocktail parties than it is about civic life. That is, politics and religion are two of the most important topics with which we need to wrangle. Who are we as a people? What does it mean to be an American? What is the proper role of government? And each of those questions heavily overlaps the notion of religion. Indeed, we also, as a nation, must continually be asking what role religion ought to play in public life.

And that's where it gets dicey. Religion, to the faithful, is extraordinarily important, rising to the level of personal identity. Insult a man's religion and you might as well be insulting the man himself--for believers, it is hard to say where religion ends and the individual begins. And religion is also culture, which must be respected simply because it is culture.

Conversely, however, religion is also a set of principles, ideas, and attitudes about how we ought to live our lives. And when those principles, ideas, and attitudes are taken out of the religious sphere and inserted into the public discourse, they then become part of the marketplace of ideas, where they must contend with the ideas of others who do not share the same kind of faith.

So what do we do? Do religious ideas get a fee pass simply because people believe them so strongly? Or, from the other way around, should religious people keep their mouths shut because those ideas are meaningless to people who believe differently?

Personally, I think both of those questions miss the mark. We can debate religion in the public sphere, easily. Participants just need to respect each other as individuals and fellow Americans. It's kind of like hating the sin but loving the sinner: I disagree with your ideas, but I respect that you have chosen a way of life that is deeply meaningful to you; OR, I understand that you are criticizing my views, but I see that you are not condemning my religion, not condemning me. This requires sensitivity and patience from all involved, to be sure, but it's not impossible.

Besides, if religious ideas aren't important enough to assert or defend, then they must not be really important. And this works both ways, for both liberals and conservatives. Remember that many leaders in the Civil Rights Movement were Christian ministers; remember that one of the great progressives in American history was William Jennings Bryan, a fundamentalist Christian. Everybody's got money in this game, whether you're a believer or not.

Of course, if you're a regular Real Art reader, you're already familiar with my ideas about discussing religion in the public discourse, but I've never stated them in quite this context.  That is, my words here are meant to be heard and understood, and perhaps even embraced, by a conservative Christian.  And I think I did a pretty nice job as far as that goes--indeed, another fellow commenting from a fundamentalist perspective clicked "like" on the comment.  So at least I got him to listen.

And that's all in a good day's work!

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$