Random thought
The number of movies I’ve seen based on Philip K. Dick books makes it difficult to find an unsullied PKD reading experience.
On the plus side, the A Scanner Darkly movie made little sense to me, so maybe that’s the way to go.
I heard Obama gave a speech at Notre Dame. How’d that go?
I’m going on vacation tomorrow to the land of the wood paneled K-Mart. I will hopefully have a report on the continuing struggle of the immigrant proletariat against the bourgeoisie’s corrupt tourist economy.
Needless to say, serious thoughts are scarce.
Helmets…for seals
You knew that, but this is still strange, even for them. In response to Joystiq’s request for their thoughts about a seal-clubbing minigame for Overlord II, they said this:
In real life, seals don’t have helmets and can’t fight back, but perhaps you’ll soon see PETA-made helmets for baby seals in Canada.
I think PETA have finally reached the pinnacle of absurdity: a statement so ridiculous that it can’t be mocked. It’s almost a perfect representation of their lunacy, only missing their trademark offensiveness (holocaust on a plate, anyone?).
Bravo, PETA.
Star Trek
I’m not much of a Star Trek guy. I’ve seen a few of the more recent movies (First Contact being the good one I’ve seen) and a smattering of TNG and DS9 episodes. This is due mostly to laziness, not any dislike of the universe. With that out of the way, the movie was fantastic. It’s not particularly deep (which I’ve seen complaints about), but it was thoroughly entertaining. There’s very little in the way of plot (we must stop evil bad guy from reaching Earth!), so it’s essentially a story about the characters. It’s amazing to me how much I know about these characters simply from pop culture. I’ve seen just a part of one episode of TOS and I rarely felt lost when the ST fans in the audience laughed or applauded the references to the series.
Now that they’ve started things off with a bang, I’m looking forward to where they go next (assuming sequels).
Other assorted thoughts: Nokia! Dr. Cameron is Kirk’s mom! Carson Beckett somehow managed to sneak into Starfleet’s barracks. Sticking Scotty in some kind of water tube contraption was dumb.
The world is ending
Michael Gerson has written a column about religion that doesn’t make me want to throw things.
At a recent conference of journalists organized by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life, Putnam outlined the conclusions of “American Grace,” based on research still being sifted and refined. Against the expectations of hard-core secularists, Putnam asserts, “religious Americans are nicer, happier and better citizens.” They are more generous with their time and money, not only in giving to religious causes but to secular ones. They join more voluntary associations, attend more public meetings, even let people cut in line in front of them more readily. Religious Americans are three to four times more socially engaged than the unaffiliated. Ned Flanders is a better neighbor.
Against the expectations of many religious believers, this dynamic has little to do with the content of belief. Theology is not the predictor of civic behavior; being part of a community is. People become social joiners and contributors when they have friends who pierce their isolation and invite their participation. And religious friends, says Putnam, are “more powerful, supercharged friends.”
Notwithstanding my hard-core secularism, this is more or less the conclusion at which I’ve arrived. Religion is a powerful social construct here. Europe is different and I haven’t quite reconciled that in my mind yet (their generally more extensive social programs replace some of religion’s functions here?).
I dislike the conclusion, but what can you do? It’s still a bit much to say our society would collapse without religion. A lot would change, but why couldn’t we follow a path similar to some European countries?
Tortured religion
This Pew survey about support for torture by religious affiliation is enlightening.
For a group that prides itself on values, evangelicals are the least likely to say torture is never justified, preferring the more relative “sometimes” and the awful “often” options. Mainline protestants have the fewest undecideds and the most in the “never” category and are pretty evenly split between often/sometimes and rarely/never. The unaffiliated prove themselves to be the most anti-torture (but they’re not sure about it, having a higher number of undecideds and fewer “nevers” than the mainline Protestants).
But I like the break out by church attendance. Weekly or monthly churchgoers are pretty comparable, but the bigger jump comes when you go from monthly attendance to seldom or never. I guess all that torture in the Bible goes straight to their heads.
But really, we’re a more pro-torture country that we should be, and that’s disheartening.
Twitter is indefensible
Matt Yglesias tries to defend using Twitter for political commentary. Is it just me, or is “blame the user, not the medium” pretty weak? No medium can make a bad commentator good, but it can certainly be ill-suited to a task. No one is tweeting investigative journalism.
Claire McCaskill claims she uses it to “drive thought and discussion.” I dare you to reconcile that with what’s there right now. There are comments about her schedule, personal comments, and approximately four comments that you could claim drive discussion. One of them is a one word comment on Specter (“Wow”) and another is a generic statement of support for Kathleen Sebelius. So I see two defensible comments. Out of twenty.
McCaskill also claim it’s a way of staying “connected.” That’s dubious and has a significant downside: her followers are more connected to her. Personally connected, given the contents of her feed. That makes them less objective when it comes to evaluating her job performance, which means she can get away with more. Maybe it’s a small effect, but being connected isn’t necessarily a plus for rational evaluation.
I don’t really care if members of Congress want to use Twitter. I have a (seldom used) Twitter account. It’s amusing. But let’s not pretend it’s a useful source of information from politicians or political commentators.
Specter's switch
So the big news today is Arlen Specter switching parties. I’m not particularly excited, but hey, it annoys Republicans, so how bad could it be?
Glenn Greenwald has some thoughts. They’re mostly good points, though I must note that saying “it is mystifying why [Democrats] would want to build their majority by embracing politicians who reject most of their ostensible views” and “Arlen Specter is one of the worst, most soul-less, most belief-free individuals in politics” is a little odd. I think the latter explains the former. Those who switch parties do drift in that direction (Jeffords being a good example). So given that Specter does seem fairly principle-free, I think Democrats can reasonably expect Specter to become relatively solid Democratic vote in the future. He won’t be the next Ted Kennedy, but he probably won’t be the next Ben Nelson, either. Though that’s unfair to Nelson, who seems to have some principles. Evan Bayh, maybe?
Religious concern trolling
I give you, Amy Sullivan:
It’s not that Obama works himself into a rant when he talks about science. He’s still calm, cool Barack, after all. But for him, it is almost strident. Sometimes it’s his language–today he complained that “We have watched as scientific integrity has been undermined and scientific research politicized in an effort to advance predetermined ideological agendas.” And sometimes it’s just his tone–when I listened to the stem-cell speech, his voice sounded uncharacteristically hard, although in reading the text later I noticed a sensitivity to dissenting beliefs that hadn’t come through in the delivery.
…
Whatever the reason, it worries me somewhat because science is one of those areas in which Obama’s generally nuanced intellectual approach would be helpful. The anti-science, anti-expert mindset is obviously troubling. But so too is the idea that science is always an unquestioned capital-G good and that anyone who raises questions stands in the way of progress.
The only way you could get that sentiment from Obama’s speech is if you haven’t been paying attention the last eight years. Or if you’re an idiot. Republicans have relentlessly politicized scientific issues: global warming, environmental dangers, obesity research, stem cells, sex education, etc. Sullivan says “most people who worry about the use of embryonic stem cells [are not] engaged in ‘effort[s] to advance predetermined ideological agendas.’” Setting aside why “most people” is the relevant category, the debate in Washington has been politicized by anti-stem cell research advocates looking to advance their agenda. They lie about and distort the efficacy of embryonic stem cell research, rather than simply argue that it’s not moral, which is what they believe. I assume Sullivan knows this, given that she wasn’t born yesterday. Even if you want to say they have a legitimate moral issue, they’ve very much not stuck to that argument (because it’s patently ridiculous and few agree with them).
We’ve had eight years of Republican abuse of science for political gain and corporate favor. We haven’t had eight years of respect for science and nuanced moral arguments about scientific research. To worry about pro-science “stridency” when Obama forthrightly condemns past abuse is absurd in our current situation.
But Sullivan is really worried that respect for science will make it harder to push religion-inspired policy. If we have to rely on empirical evidence, my absurd superstitions won’t be good enough to justify my preferred policies! Let’s just back up a little on being all pro-science. It’s very important that we allow fairy tales to influence our discourse.
Then again, religious concern trolling is what Sullivan is best at, so should we be surprised?
Jeans and the decline of modern society
Presumably you saw this last week, but George Will penned a column denouncing denim. Denim! Fun quotes:
Seventy-five percent of American “gamers” — people who play video games — are older than 18 and nevertheless are allowed to vote.
Presumably Will lost a game of Pong in his younger years and has never quite recovered.
Denim is the clerical vestment for the priesthood of all believers in democracy’s catechism of leveling — thou shalt not dress better than society’s most slovenly. To do so would be to commit the sin of lookism — of believing that appearance matters. That heresy leads to denying the universal appropriateness of everything, and then to the elitist assertion that there is good and bad taste.
I wear jeans. I think there’s good and bad taste. I think George Will’s taste is the latter.
This is not complicated. For men, sartorial good taste can be reduced to one rule: If Fred Astaire would not have worn it, don’t wear it. For women, substitute Grace Kelly.
Ok, Will’s taste is bad and old. Am I supposed to go to work dressed like this?
Look, George. I know how you feel. You couldn’t write a column just to complain about denim. So you had to connect to everything in society that you think is bad. You had to attribute it to a rejection of the idea that appearances matter. The problem is, that’s not true. You’re just old. It’s ok, though. You’ve got a good job. You can lie about global warming without consequence. You have money and probably a family. Surely something can fill the void so you don’t have to inflict your half-baked ramblings on those of us who have real jobs.
Also, this should be read, for the picture and caption.
Demand answers
Mark Hemingway wants to know Obama’s opinion of a scene in one of Kal Penn’s movies. It apparently offended his delicate sensibilities. Hard-nosed journalism, people.
Speaking of idiots, there’s a tax day tea-bagger protest in Bozeman on Wednesday. I’m tempted to wander by, if only because I’m sure it will be unintentionally hilarious.
And also because I’m a member of ACORN planning to sabotage the protest. Don’t tell anyone.
