Saturday, December 10, 2011
POLITICS vs. RELIGION
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
BELIEVING
I was being a nasty little prick, something that came easy to me.
I think about that event now and am ashamed at the memory, even at age 65. “Believing in” whatever was the phrase of choice, and it could be cruelly used to separate the accepted from the unaccepted. Looking back, what we were really asking was whether or not a person was possessed of such inane credulity that he or she could completely surrender all critical thought and accept the magical, hocus-pocus nature of what we, the majority, deemed to be real.
Now, I do not here accuse all religious persons of inanity or irrationality. I am merely describing what I subjectively expected the Jew (or whomever) to buy into when I was 13 years old. Unfortunately, I think a lot of religious persons have not matured in their thinking since THEY were 13 years old, possessed of the same sort of intolerant thinking as was I, and today, religious belief is frequently defined by intolerance of the beliefs of others. If one is possessed of knowing the One True Way, then the ways of others are perforce corrupt!
I think that is what bothers me about religion the most—the intolerance of others. The comedian, Lewis Black, says that the “9/11” terrorists (and others like them) lack a sense of humor. I agree with that. That is how I see religious belief today—a surrender of critical thought, which forces one to be tolerant, because the more one knows, the less certain one must become of one’s own conclusions.
Real scientists understand this way of thinking. I once read a definition of scientific theory as being something that could be proven wrong. With religion, it seems that most of the adherents are firmly convinced that NOTHING could be wrong with their opinions. Religious persons are absolutely convinced they know The Way. On the other hand, scientists know that if they submit their research to peer review, one of their peers may find something wrong with it. That is the risk taken, and the reward is having it thus tested and others drawing the same conclusions, unable to find error. Peer review is at the core of scientific research. Religion cannot withstand “peer review.”
Nor does religion require “peer review.” By its own definitions, it is beyond proof and research and question. Religion must be accepted “on faith.” The human mind may question, but religion requires that the answers all point in the same direction. That is just fine with me, and I am obliged by oath to defend the rights of those who embrace such, but I cannot accept the unconditional surrender of critical thought necessary to embrace religious “belief.”
I am not “anti-theist.” I know that some atheists are “anti-theist.” I think Madalyn Murray O’Hair was “anti-theist,” and she is probably the archetype of an atheist in most people’s minds, so that whenever they encounter “atheism,” they see “anti-theism.” I am an atheist, which is a loaded word, so I frequently describe myself as a “non-believer.” It is less antagonistic. I am simply “without theism.” I do not spell “atheist” with a capital “A.” I do not belong to any such organizations, and I do not proselytize and I, frankly, cannot understand how one may advocate for a belief in nothing at all! Some atheists do that; I don’t.
The personal religious beliefs of others are none of my business. I can’t prove that any believer is wrong. I can’t prove that God does NOT exist. Logically, one cannot prove a negative. I simply don’t concern myself with what others may personally believe. However, if and when there is an attempt to have MY government spend MY tax dollars and/or use MY government property to advance religion, then that is MY business. I will fight such nonsense tooth and nail.
Majorities (five out of nine Justices) on the US Supreme Court have ruled that governmental bodies may open their meetings with non-sectarian prayers, sort of a generic plea to whatever deities may be out there. They have also peculiarly ruled that Wiccans (and perhaps other “weird” religious believers) are not entitled to inclusion in official governmental prayer lists as are the “mainstream” believers in “real” deities. The Supremes have created a mighty slippery slope and have no one to blame but themselves. That all the Justices have been religious believers (currently 6 Catholics and 3 Jews) may have something to do with their tolerance for such governmental religious activity, but I believe the said majorities have misread the Constitution. I think that a majority of the Founders (not all of them) were very clear that government in the United States should be rigidly secular, so that no one gets a religious leg up on anyone else. The religious buffoons on the Supreme Court seem to utterly disregard this clear history. Besides, I don't think any God is going to take the blame for whatever elected officials do to the People's Business at government meetings!
One of the three things that Thomas Jefferson specified on his tombstone was to be known as the author of the “Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom,” still valid law to this day, codified as Va. Code Section 57-1. Many believe the Statute to be a precursor to the federal First Amendment. It is fairly lengthy, and it contains a fairly explicit rant by Jefferson disparaging the influence of the then-dominant Anglican clergy, who were trying to get the Anglican (later Episcopal) Church established in Virginia as the “official” tax-supported church. Patrick Henry was one of the supporters, in opposition to Jefferson and James Madison.
Near the end of the Statute, Jefferson observes that later politicians will surely try to change the Statute or repeal it, but he brands such future efforts as ill-advised. For Jefferson, unyielding government secularism was preferred and is certainly reflected in the language of the Statute. True to prediction, Republican Delegate Bill Janis of Goochland County attempted, around 2007, to modify the language of the Statute by specifically authorizing the official conduct of Christian devotionals in public schools. Fortunately, that bit of idiocy, approved by the hot-headed Christian “Taliban” in the House of Delegates, was quietly quashed in the Virginia Senate.
Upon being admitted to the Virginia State Bar in 1973, I took an oath to support and defend the Constitution of the United States of America and the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia. (So did Bill Janis, also a licensed lawyer.) I was proud to take that oath and consider myself to be bound thereby until death, despite my having resigned my licensure as a lawyer. I am, therefore, obliged to defend the personal right of anyone to believe whatever he or she wishes to believe and to practice those beliefs with or without others. I am also obliged to resist the establishment of religion in government. One’s personal right of belief does not extend to using one’s incidental position as a government official to advance those beliefs. Former Chief Justice Roy Moore had to learn this hard lesson when he moved his big rock (bearing the engraved “11” Commandments) into the lobby of the Alabama Supreme Court.
Atheists come in all different flavors and stripes. None of us bears any more likeness to any other than do Presbyterians or Catholics or Jews. We are as different from one another as any other human group, and I know this is hard to fathom among believers. I don’t presume to speak (or write) for any other atheist. But I hope I make my own opinions very clear.
Sunday, July 31, 2011
TRAIN THROUGH CHINA
By way of Australia.
In late 1986, after I had broken up with a gal, I decided to go see the “Americas Cup Races” in Australia, the first time they had been hosted outside the United States. Four years earlier, the Australians had won the Cup in an upset series of racing victories in Newport, Rhode Island. I was 40 years old; I had just angrily quit the “formal” practice of law, cold turkey; I had no obligations to anyone; and I had a need to travel. I needed to get the Hell out of Dodge! However, I had just lost a religious liberty case in the Supreme Court of Virginia (as expected), and I had to get an appeal filed for my atheist client with the US Supreme Court by Tax Day, April 15. I was just gonna “wing it.”
So, I put myself into the hands of an experienced travel agent in Northern Virginia, and she worked up a very nice itinerary. I was to spend a week in Sydney then travel west to Perth for the Races, scheduled for late January or early February of 1987. I figured I had about two months all told to “burn,” so I decided to schedule a trip to Hong Kong and China thereafter, since I was gonna be “in the neighborhood.” That left me with at least 5 weeks in Australia, and I was really looking forward to it. I had to pack my “summer” clothes for semi-tropical Australia, and my “winter” clothes for my other travels in China! China is every bit as far north as is the United States, and it was really WINTER there!
Australia is about the same geographic size as the contiguous United States (as is China), but most of it is arid desert. Very dry. Open fires are banned by law there, so when someone throws “shrimp on the barbie,” they have to cover the cooking coals with a sheet of steel and cook everything on the sheet. I also had to learn to look to my RIGHT before crossing a street because, with right-hand drive, they drive on the left, and closer traffic is going to be to a pedestrian’s right, EXACTLY opposite of the United States! I almost got run over a couple of times! Another neat thing I noticed is that people in the Southern Hemisphere are “upside-down” from those of us usually in the Northern Hemisphere, so the crescent Moon is “pointed” in the opposite direction! Observing the phases of the Moon was difficult.
The sailboat races were being held in Fremantle, the small fishing village on the coast of the Indian Ocean about ten miles from Perth, which was further inland. Perth is a very clean and neat medium-sized city and reminded me a lot of Richmond, Virginia. I spent most of my time in Fremantle and very little of it in Perth. I was rooming with a nice family in a small suburb of Perth, about halfway between Perth and Fremantle, and they tried to teach me the vagaries of cricket. They were watching a big tournament on the “telly.” The rules are really bizarre, but the game is quite interesting, once one gets the “hang” of it! The adult son in the family was a legalized betting “bookie”! Australians love their cricket and their horse races!
There was a very handy local trolley running back and forth between Fremantle and Perth, so I did not need a car. I did a lot of walking, but I rode that trolley a lot, too. I got to Perth a few days before the defending series was finished, so I got interested in the defending semifinals between a New Zealand challenger and an Australian defender, who ultimately won, but I have since forgotten their names. Dennis Connor, the American challenger, rolled into Fremantle and demonstrated his sailing prowess. He won the Races four straight. The poor Australians won NOTHING! The Races were over almost before they had begun!
It was February of 1987. It was a wonderful time to be in China, smack between the “Gang of Four” and “Tiananmen Square.” Things were wide open! I was on a “tour of one” when I went into China from Hong Kong, complete with my own private train compartment (or so I thought). I had already spent the four days in Hong Kong before boarding the train for Guangzhou. Predictably, the Chinese railroad had re-sold the remaining berths in my compartment and pocketed the money, even though I’d already paid for the whole thing.
I spent a bit more than two weeks traveling up and down the eastern seaboard of China by train, with stayovers in Guangzhou (Canton), Shanghai and Beijing. As it was winter, there were almost no “gringos” in China, at least not until I got to Beijing. I had my own car, driver and tour guide in Guangzhou and Shanghai, and I got to choose pretty much whatever I wanted to see. But I got lumped in with those other “gringos” once I got to Beijing.
I first spent a day traveling north to Guangzhou, then another two days and a night traveling to Shanghai thereafter. The others in my train compartment could not speak English, so I spent my time reading or clumsily demonstrating my nascent magic tricks with cards, which I was studying and practicing at the time. Communication involved a lot of hand gestures and grunting! I drank a lot of tea and avoided the dining car, as I had been thus warned. Instead, at each stop I was jumping off the train and hastily gobbling snacks at the kiosks and then racing back to my compartment.
The “toilet” in the passenger car was a hole in the floor with a handle on the wall to grab as one squatted over the hole! Anything that went through the hole was just left on the railroad ties, clearly visible through the hole, but blurred! That mightily discouraged eating anyway! After mostly starving myself on the two-day trip back to Hong Kong from Beijing, I was taken by some compartment-mates to a dim sum breakfast across the street from the train station in Guangzhou, and I ate like a monster! That is where I developed a strong craving (to this day) for steamed pot- stickers!
Dim sum is an interesting concept. Most Chinese restaurants are on the second floor of buildings, and most are in large rooms with big round tables, shared by unrelated diners. Wait-staff come by, pushing carts laden with various dishes of different foods, and one chooses whatever one wishes to eat, and as many dishes as one wishes. When it comes time to leave, the wait-staff write up one’s check, counting the various empty dishes on the table, and the resultant total is one’s bill, paid at the cashier’s desk by the door. It’s like a mobile cafeteria! All you dare eat!
I returned to Hong Kong for another four days and finished fittings for a beautiful tailored suit. There was a lot of chatter at the time about the expected handover of Hong Kong to China ten years or so thence (and now we are seeing the aftermath). Hong Kong was a British colony at the time, with a lot of international banking. I made friends on the plane from Bangkok with a Chinese fellow working for a Swiss bank, who was born in Shanghai but became a naturalized American citizen when he attended graduate school at the University of Kansas.
He spoke excellent English and was quite interested in my discovery of Chou en-Lai’s 1941 Buick sedan I had seen when I visited Chou’s shrine in Shanghai. Chou had driven around Shanghai (where the Chinese Communist Party was founded) in the Buick, as was common at the time in postwar China. I was quite interested in it since I have a 1941 Buick convertible! My time in Shanghai was magical. I will never forget it, and I was truly privileged to experience it.
After I left Hong Kong, I flew to Maui and got out my summer clothes again. I spent a week SCUBA diving with a buddy from Fairfax, Virginia, who met me there, then we flew home via LAX. I had to call a friend to come pick me up in Fairfax and take me back home to Orange, Virginia. I had been gone over two months!
Above all, I had learned from my visit in China not to ask what I was eating until after I had finished it!
STATES' WRONGS (Part 1)
THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS "STATES' RIGHTS"!!!
As a life-long Southerner, I have heard that phrase ALL MY LIFE, and it is total nonsense!
There is no such phrase as "states' rights" in the US Constitution. It is a fabrication of the worm-eaten mind of John C. Calhoun, a Federalist turncoat who brazenly flipped his political philosophy when he moved from New England to South Carolina in the early 1800's and started drinking whiskey out of those prissy lead-crystal decanters! Calhoun based his states'-rights "thinking" on the twin pillars of "nullification" and "interposition," further fabricated by the enfeebled elderly minds of James Madison and Thomas Jefferson, respectively, who foolishly suggested in their age-addled dotages that the states were individually empowered to disregard the legislation and powers of the Congress, as had arguably been the case under the thoroughly discredited and discarded "Articles of Confederation," which almost cost Washington and the nascent United States victory in the Revolutionary War, BECAUSE Washington had a lot of trouble getting the former colonies to (1) fully fund that war and (2) provide enough soldiers to fight in it!
One should note that there is NO preservation or savings clause in the US Constitution for the worthless, silly "Articles of Confederation," and that was no accident! George Washington, presiding over the Constitutional Convention, would not have stood for it! (Jefferson was nowhere to be found at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. He was minister to France.)
Most so-called "states' rightists" will cite the 10th Amendment as authority for their wet-brained thinking, but the 10th Amendment says NOTHING about "rights." What it basically provides is a strict limitation on the POWERS of Congress, but too many wishful thinkers and other assorted twits read into that a "blank check" for states' POWERS, and that is simply not so. It DOES say that the POWERS not granted to Congress ARE reserved (not "granted") to the States and the People, but one may not, therefore, infer that "the People" have thereby given carte blanche to the states! NO! After the Revolution, "the People" did not give carte blanche to ANYTHING! They were not that stupid!
One must, instead, refer to each state's own constitution for whatever "the People" have empowered that particular state to do. The widely-held notion that, somehow, unlimited POWERS are implicitly granted is just nonsense. A state may have ONLY those powers that are (further) specifically granted by "the People" to that state, within that state's own constitution! How hard is that to grasp, given the history of our Revolution and the People's shared desire to get out from under the thumbs of indifferent/remote/ detached autocrats and monarchs? (It was a bad time for autocrats all over back in those days!)
It is the NINTH AMENDMENT that deals with RIGHTS, and rights belong ONLY to "the People," NOT to states! A government may have only POWERS, or the absence thereof in the face of RIGHTS enjoyed by "the People." Individual rights are paramount--they ALWAYS "trump" powers. Rights are implicit and presumed and expansive, but powers are not. Only "the People" may subordinate their individual RIGHTS to specific POWERS granted by them to governments. There can be no other legitimate empowerment of any government, federal or state! (And, there are no "group" rights--only individual rights that may be exercised by groups of people collectively.)
Admittedly, MY philosophy is not shared by very many people, but I am RIGHT! To Hell with everybody else! Neither Arizona nor any other STATE has any business trying to regulate immigration. It is about POWER; that's all. If a STATE is deemed to have the POWER to regulate who may cross its borders in any way, then it might eventually try to enforce some sort of prohibition or restriction against persons coming in from other US states. That is simply unacceptable. The remedy for unwise or improper or inadequate FEDERAL immigration enforcement is political only--throw the bastards out at the next election! The states are not legitimately empowered to regulate any sort of immigration, and for damned good reasons. Power is a very corrupting influence and is easily misused by imperfect people who have no business using it.
And, I'd be willing to bet a steak dinner that "immigration regulation" is a power NOT specifically granted in the Arizona constitution to that state! I'd further bet another steak dinner that Arizona is not worried about Canadians crossing the border, either. They seem concerned only with those pesky brown Mexicans who "talk funny" and breed like flies!
Y'all come back now, heah?
Friday, July 29, 2011
ASH BURIAL
In an effort to be environmentally compatible, they decided to bury the ash in such a way as to make it indistinguishable from its surroundings, so that no one would be able to tell the ash from the hole in the ground.
Sunday, July 17, 2011
BOOMER DEPRESSION
Regarding the current economic mess and the hopeful politicians and economists who suggest that "recovery" is just around the corner, I have just had a more unsettling thought.
A partial cause of our shared misery may well be the aging "Baby Boomer" population and a concurrent drop in consumer spending and investing, especially in real estate. We "Boomers" have been the single largest cohort to ever move through the markets! We are the "pig in the python," so to say. And though now we may HAVE a lot of money, we are neither spending it nor investing it much in real estate! I would expect that the savings rate might actually go up over the next decade.
I am almost 65 years old, and I know I will not likely buy another piece of real property, and I am not going to be buying many cars in the future, either. My grandparents bought a new 1959 Olds sedan (in their late 60's) and drove it for over 13 years. It was their last car! My mother, at age 70, bought a new 1990 Lexus, her last car, and I sold it for her in 2006. Old people don't buy cars like we "Boomers" did. Now, we are getting old. Maybe we should invest in "Depends" instead!
I fear that the US economy got "addicted" to the huge "Boomer" cashflow between 1960 and 2005, and now we are in long-term withdrawal!
STAND-UP COMEDY BLUES (Song)
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
JOSE, CAN YOU SEE?
* * *
... all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
[Extract, Article VI, Constitution of the United States of America.]
As Independence Day is celebrated this year, there will be, of course, a lot of emphasis on pledging allegiance to the US flag and singing the "Star-Spangled Banner," a song that was written during the Battle of Baltimore Harbor during the War of 1812. As elementary schoolchildren some 55 years ago, my classmates and I were assured that Betsy Ross had made for the Founders the first American flag with the circle of 13 stars. Unfortunately, that is not true.
There was no "official" US flag at the time of the adoption of the US Constitution, about 13 years and a Revolutionary War after the Declaration of Independence was signed in Philadelphia on this date in 1776. A majority of the Founders was apprehensive about the notion of citizens pledging their loyalty to ANYTHING other than the Constitution itself, so Article VI was thus included. Since that time, it has become fashionable to insist that newly naturalized citizens and politicians (and most others) prove their loyalty to the United States from time to time by publicly pledging allegiance to the flag. A photo of Barack Obama has recently been widely circulated in e-mails showing him failing to cover his heart with his right hand when singing the National Anthem, thus "proving" he is really unpatriotic and is probably a Muslim born in Africa to boot! I recall that the Congress in the mid-1950's even added the "under God" phrase to the Pledge in the naȉve hope of weeding out or exposing atheistic (godless) Communists who, presumably, would not thus pledge. I duly recited that Pledge both ways, before and after. My personal morality was not the least bit improved thereby!
It seems that the limitation of Article VI to pledging loyalty to the Constitution is similar to the injunction handed down by Moses to the Israelites in the Ten Commandments to worship no "graven image," the idea being that their deity, Yahweh, should not be framed or depicted or limited by some human-fashioned object or symbol. Yahweh was considered much bigger than any of that. So, too, are the abstract concepts contained in the US Constitution much more profound than the constraints of the human mind, so there arguably should not be demanded of anyone a conflicting pledge of loyalty or "allegiance" to a (mere) piece of cloth or symbol depicting a flag. The concepts of the Constitution powerfully transcend such objects and symbols.
It also seems that, these days, some are more respectful of and loyal to the "flag" than respectful of and loyal to the Constitution, ESPECIALLY the Bill of Rights, which is an integral part of the US Constitution. These days, few American politicians enthusiastically embrace the Bill of Rights, though most will enthusiastically pledge their allegiance to the flag! Under the First Amendment, one may certainly pledge anything one wishes to a piece of cloth or symbol (or not), but one of the first official acts enabled by Adolf Hitler after he was named Chancellor of Germany in the early 1930's was to criminalize "desecration" of the Hakkenkreuz (swastika), the official symbol of the Nazi Party and later identified with the country itself!
Now, I am not here equating the inherent evil of the Nazi swastika with the American flag, but I do believe that it is unwise to pledge one's loyalty (or allegiance) to an object or symbol, because such things have a way of changing in their significance and meaning over time. These days, the American flag is genuinely regarded by most as a symbol of freedom, courage and truth, and I would not suggest anything to the contrary. But, none of us know what the American flag may come to represent 100 years from now. Pledging one's loyalty to the concepts and principles set forth in the US Constitution is a much more powerful, immutable standard to live by and swear by, unlikely to change in meaning with time.
So, on this date, when the burgers and weenies are sizzling on the grill and the fireworks start to pop, it may be useful to contemplate what a remarkable, amazing document is the US Constitution. At some point, each of us should quietly affirm his or her "pledge" of loyalty and allegiance to the US Constitution and Bill of Rights and be sincerely grateful to be an American, governed thereby.
SWAT = Gestapo
There was a TV program on the "paramilitary-fication" of police action and the new creation of SWAT enforcement teams for all sorts of regulatory agencies, especially in the federal government. The notion of "kicking ass and taking names" while wearing "combat" gear is a powerful aphrodisiac for the authoritarians in our midst. The humorless "straight-arrows" going into and dominating law enforcement are scary. Important doctrines within the Bill of Rights are being shredded in the process. A lot of federal aid to law enforcement has emphasized and funded the SWAT mentality. "Order" is being emphasized over "law."
Fed up with the illusion of rampant crime pimped by politicians of evil intent (esp. suspected of certain "ethnic undesirables" (like immigrants)), "average Americans" are willing to tolerate (and smirk at) the "ass-kicking" approach to law enforcement, and those fed up with "legal technicalities" like banning the precipitous kicking in of doors of homes are thus supportive (until it happens to them). There has been (especially since Ray-Gun) a serious and deplorable judicial backlash against the Bill of Rights and the "Exclusionary Rule."
The likelihood of anal rape in prison is a source of great mirth, especially among most cops. Most judges are indifferent. The threat of it is frequently used by cops as a means of extorting confessions during interrogations.
Legislatures routinely ramp up maximum prison terms for offenses, fabricate more and more new crimes out of "whole cloth," and routinely convert misdemeanors to felonies. "Zero tolerance" is the rule rather than the exception.
Courts ROUTINELY enforce the abandonment or forfeiture of personal criminal-procedure rights by unwitting, naïve suspects, to their serious detriment. The recent show on HBO, "Hot Coffee," about the "'Stella' vs. McDonald's" case, also explored the routine forfeiture of personal civil-procedure rights by persons who seek to deal with credit-card companies, cell-phone companies, investment brokers, Internet host companies and other corporate entities who demand the use of services agreements that include forfeiture of rights to court trials and other procedural rights, and subordination to mandatory, binding arbitration (with familiar arbitrators selected exclusively by the corporations) instead. These clauses are being routinely enforced by courts now to relieve the "serious burden" on court dockets that could arguably be relieved by appointing and paying more judges with higher-tax dollars instead.
It is against public policy for a whore to seek judicial enforcement against a "john" of a contract for a sexual services rendered, but it is patently NOT a violation of public policy for law enforcement or corporations to induce the unwitting forfeiture of personal judicial rights! Go figure.
Those the police identify as "perps" are despised and presumed guilty by most of society. The notion of hurting them physically and mentally is very attractive, and the threat of convicting innocents with "railroad" justice is dismissed, so long as the presumed guilty are as cruelly treated as possible, both before conviction and certainly thereafter. Draconian punishments are NEVER enough in the eyes of many!
The tortures routinely administered by the military and CIA at Abu Ghraib during the presidential administration of George W. Bush were considered "appropriate" by many Americans who believed the victims "deserved" it for what happened on "September 11." The Obama Administration and Attorney General Eric Holder have done NOTHING about it ever since.
We are truly in dangerous times, MOSTLY because a majority of the US Supremes ARE indifferent to all of this as well.
