Archives for December 2004

Ever see the 1982 film Sophie’s Choice? Try this real life account:

For Australian mother-of-two Jillian Searle, who let go of her older son Lachie, 5, in a life-or-death decision as the wall of water struck, there was a happy ending.

Lachie was found alive about two hours later clinging to a door and, though traumatized by his ordeal, looked uninjured as his mother spoke to reporters on arrival back in Australia.

"I knew I had to let go of one of them and I just thought I’d better let go of the one that’s the oldest," said Searle, who had then held on to two-year-old Blake in the Thai resort island of Phuket.

"And I was screaming, trying to find him, and we thought he was dead."

I wonder how many similar incidents, among survivors and the now 125,000 dead (can you comprehend the magnitude of that?), did not turn out so well.

I received an email from my cousin George, still on the scene in Phuket.

Ok, here’s the scoop.  All is not well.  The coastal  areas are smashed, including our little ton sai beach.  Beth & Annie were in hammocks at Freedom bar and I was 200 yards down the beach warming up on an easy climb.  The tide was at max high, so we had to skip around to climb, if ya know what I mean (all you beach climbers!).  Then we noticed that the waterline was dropping FAST; we looked out to sea, and saw a huge wave coming.   Everyone stared open mouthed and then ran like heck.  I made it to a ladder  and made it up.  I was frantic about Beth and Annie but could do nothing except watch the waves hit Freedom Bar.  They made it up the hill fine; I found out later.  Then I went down the ladder in a daze; I don’t remember much except picking up a little dog, when the next, and biggest one hit.  I ran for my life, and made it!  That’s all there is.  We helped with the cleanup and now wait to see what happens.

I’ve not much to say about the horrific disaster in southeast Asia. It’s all been said.

What makes it real for me is that I’ve been to a lot of those places. I spent months in Thailand in the late 80’s and have vacationed in Phuket twice (note to media talking heads: it’s pronounced “p-hoo-ket,” not “fooket”). I’ve sunbathed and swam the waters of Patong Beach. I was even there over a Christmas holiday, 1990.

I once enjoyed a delightful stay of a few days in Penang, Malaysia. Passed through Bangladesh a couple of times. Not so great, that. Spent several days in Jakarta, Indonesia in about 1988. It’s on Java, not Sumatra, but you get some sense of the country and its people.

While transiting the The Malacca Straits by ship between Singapore, Malaysia, and Indonesia, I recall standing on the bridge wing watching the eastern coastline of the enormous jungle island of Sumatra go slowly by. Later, on our way to the Persian Gulf, we stopped briefly in Sri Lanka to refuel.

It also turns out that a cousin of mine, an expert rock climber and mountaineer, with whom I just visited two weeks ago at our Christmas party, was scaling a rock cliff on or near Phuket when the tsunami hit. We have word that he and his companions escaped unhurt.

Thank God for that. But then, who could possibly believe in a literal, “intelligent” God after something like this? This, this is real and there’s not a fantasy man can conjure up in his head that makes this particular reality one less bit rotten than it is. But God does exist, nonetheless. Do you know where? He exists in the form of "stingy" Americans and Europeans now gladly donating to the tune of many millions of dollars (apart from what governments are doing). He exists in the form of the thousands of patriots and ex-patriots on the scene in each of those countries lending a hand–to both dignify the dead and aid the survivors. God is much closer than we think.

Here’s the photo on the Christmas card my wife sent out this year (to those who know Rotor, anyway). So, Rotor (and Beatrice and I) wish you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Happy New year. I also offer you a sincere hope that you endeavor to make of 2005 something more than you made of 2004, along with a wish for the prosperity on all levels that’s sure to follow.

That’s right, it’s Christmas, not "Xmas" and all that other rot. If you’re telling people "Happy Holidays" because you’re embarrassed to say "Merry Christmas," or paralyzed by over-sensitivity, just get over it and let yourself go. Trust me. You’ll feel much better. Go. With. Christmas.

Christmas is such an event in Western Civilization because it’s a recognition and celebration of a set of core values and beliefs at the very root of this great civilization, whether Christ is to you a literal being, or to me a great metaphor. An atheist, such as myself, who can’t appreciate the splendor* of Christmas and all that it represents (religiously, commercially, and all that) is just hopelessly materialist to the point were we are left to wonder how these people manage to care about anything. If you can’t care about Christmas, for Christ’s sake, what on Earth can you care about?

I just hope Kim is right about all this misdirected energy swinging the other way.

*(Not a word I’ve ever used much, but my friend Greg Swann has gone and got me hooked on it, so hat tip to him.)

Since I respect the individual freedom morally implicit in the recognition of individual rights, I have little problem with most "values" people choose for themselves, to include the pursuit of almost no value other than basic subsistence. I’ll condemn them as stupid, having no class or sense of splendor, but as the one says whom I credit below, "everyone gets to go to hell in their own go-cart." I agree, and I often have to remind myself because I’m impatient, intolerant, and have great difficulty suffering fools.

On the other hand, if someone wishes to be a know-nothing in life, isn’t it fitting if such person is never charged with any great responsibility? If only. The world of private interests, free association, and free markets tends to work that stuff out pretty well, with the general exception that ignoramuses are too dumb to know that they have no business charging themselves with the upbringing of a child.

And in the public sphere, these people are all too happy to vote.

See what sort of people I’m talking about here. Full article here. Do you grasp this? After the human animal has taken himself so, so far, we have come to relegate ourselves to a social hierarchy where public issues are decided by whomever is able to form together the largest group of idiots and ignoramuses. What’s worse, we’ve sawed off the limb of Western Civilization upon which we’ve stood. We’re locked into a rotting democracy where the majority is far too stupid and incapable to mend its own ways via the only non-violent method available to it–the vote. In such a scenario, utter collapse seems the only avenue of non-violent remediation left available.

(Link: Beck, who treats the subject as usual.)

This is all so very "interesting." Here, too.

This is just sure to be one big nightmare over the next few years. Count on it. If any “reform” does come out of it, you can be sure that it will be so convoluted and full of qualifications, exceptions, safe havens, minimum return guarantees, and compromises that it will be no real “improvement” over what’s currently in place. So, stand by. The democratic political process is about the worst vehicle imaginable for producing a result consonant with reality. It never has. It never will.

I can just hear the talking heads with all their “facts” and “figures” now, on both sides, and the plain truth of the matter is that not a goddamned one of them has the slightest clue about what he or she is talking about. They’ll all talk as though they know and understand what future results a particular course of action will produce, but they’re all full of shit—down to the last man.

And the hidden, never-acknowledged premise at the bottom of the whole putrid mess is that those now on “social security” are forcibly extracting a livelihood, to the tune of 15% off the top, from everyone else who works and is trying to make their way in life, support a family, and get ahead a little. It’s an inescapable fact, made “tidy” only by the irrelevant “point” that the agent of this grand theft is the “government.”

This undercuts the whole affair, from the first breath to the last nail—which is why you’ll never hear it uttered by anyone recognized as an “authority” in the matter. And why should they? The “reformists” have just as much of a stake in perpetuating this fraud (with a few “tweaks,” mind you) as do the commies who bow at the altar of the God of “Social Security.”

But don’t get me wrong. I haven’t a care in the world if millions of people want to line up and sign up for a Ponzi Scheme. Have at it. Enjoy yourselves. Ponzi Schemes exist in the private world, too, and there are always plenty of people who believe such frauds will produce better results than careful, patient investment over the long term. Forget the facts, because facts aren’t what’s important to people like this. What allures them is the same thing that allures “beneficiaries” to Social Security: the effortlessness of it. Something for nothing. It’s the age old Holy Grail.

The fact is that sound investment, of the sort that everyone is capable beats “Social Security” hands down, in every way, and it’s not even close. If you think otherwise, you’re wrong. But worse, you’re stupid. You just are, and you might was well face it. Not only that, but investments are assets, whereas, “social security” is an “entitlement.” You don’t own “social security” benefits, so you can’t sell them, rent them out, loan them out, endow a cause you believe in, or pass them on to heirs.

What this all means is the same thing it meant when you stopped to ponder all the arguments for communism back in the day when they were all the rage amongst the “elite,” the oh-so-smart academics, and Hollywood. It was a simple question: “if communism is so great, why can’t anyone leave?” The obvious answer then and still is that allowing people to flee would have rendered an economic collapse overnight. The very same thing can be said of “social security.” If it’s so great, even better than carefully managed private investments, then why compel everyone to participate? Wouldn’t most naturally participate on their own? The answer to that question will forever be skipped over, because there is no honest answer that establishes “social security” as anything but a coercive scheme for people of a certain age to stop producing and live off everyone else.

If people could opt out, they would do so in droves and the whole miserable abomination to mutual well-being, good-will to fellow man, pride, respect and productiveness would collapse. And, naturally, we clearly understand why. It would be those willing to live by their own means, taking their chances, and refusing to make other men their slaves who would leave, leaving only “consumers,” with nary a producer among them.

Billy Beck has his take on the mess, too.

Update: And don’t believe for one instant the false concern for those, under a voluntary social security system, who would not invest wisely, or at all. Let’s just cut the crap and say it. It’s about keeping everyone possible enslaved to this wretched mess of a "retirement plan," and the worse this "system" gets, the harder and faster will all the "beneficiaries" cling to their slaves.

Things exist in accordance with their natures, and to the extent they act, they act in accordance with their natures. So…

We have a generation of politicians, of both parties and of whom Thompson is symbolic, who want to say "yes" to voters: Yes, you can have what you want, and you can have it now. The solution to this problem requires leaders to say "no" to voters: No, you cannot have all the retirement benefits you’ve been promised or desire, because we can’t afford them. Americans reject that message, and our leaders don’t dare deliver it.

…

In wealthy democracies — welfare states all — individual benefits once conferred are considered sacrosanct, but when their total costs threaten the collective good, they must somehow be controlled. There’s the paralyzing contradiction. The politics of "yes" must ultimately yield to the politics of "no" — and the longer it’s delayed, the more painful it will be.

That’s Robert Samuelson in the WaPo. So, as I was saying, things exist in accordance with their natures. To wit, McDonald’s sells burgers and fries and not cucumber & watercress sandwiches because it’s a burgers and fries fast-food joint. Duh. Babies cry, rub their food in their hair, and crap their diapers because they’re babies and not Washington Post columnists (though I might be drawing too fine a distinction, there). My Hummer climbs tall mountains, but can’t get me to Hawaii because it’s a great SUV, but doesn’t float worth shit. Duh. Duh. Duh.

So why is it that virtually no one can grasp the nature of politics in a Democracy, and instantly recognize that what Samuelson is proposing is as fantastical as me expressing a sincere hope that my Hummer will carry my wife and our respective parents to Hawaii for our trip in February?

But Samuelson is right about one thing when he says that "The politics of ‘yes’ must ultimately yield to the politics of ‘no’ — and the longer it’s delayed, the more painful it will be." What he doesn’t understand is that this change requires immutable reality to assert itself. When that happens in this particular situation, it’s not going to be pretty–and "democracy" is going to be the very last thing anyone’s worried about.

(link: Franks)

I hate busybodies. I suppose it’s because that of all the hypocrisies we’re guilty of at times throughout our lives, being a busybody has never been one of them, for me. I loathe them so because I can do so guiltlessly; because the farthest thing from my substantial sphere of interests are those ridiculous values and actions of others that cause me no harm.

Most laws are a product of busybodyism, designed to make people stupid. Don’t think about what you’re doing and its effect on yourself and others. Don’t exercise reason. Just recall the law—and behave.

At about 7 a.m. this morning, I was on the last 200 yards of a 3-mile walk with Rotor, my 16 lb. rat terrier. Now, because a good portion of that walk is along avenues of varying activity in the morning, I have Rotor on a leash. It’s not that he doesn’t mind well, and he’s never aggressive with other people. It’s that he’s a dog, after all—a man-created, selectively bread derivative of the wolf—and wolves didn’t evolve in concrete jungles with 2-ton vehicles whizzing by. Rotor loves other dogs—virtually all other dogs—and when he sees them, he loses himself in excitement. So, good stewardship demands that I take responsibility for his safety.

But once we get to the last leg of the walk through the grass fields of the local high school, and then down two residential streets to home, I take Rotor off the leash. I’ve been doing this every morning, religiously, for two years. Back to that last 200 yards. There’s another guy about my age or older walking his dog, on leash, in the opposite direction. Rotor, as he always does, greets this guy’s dog (as dogs do). It’s important to note that had Rotor been on a leash, it would have made no difference. They still would have greeted each other.

And…this was all very friendly. No growling or snarling. Just, you know…sniffing.

I saw it in his eyes. I knew it was going to come out of the f___er’s mouth before he even opened it. “You should have him on a leash.”

Now, do you grasp why he said that, other than that he’s a stupid shit? He said it because he had no reason by which to admonish me to leash the dog, such as my dog harassing him or his dog—in which case, my only response should have been a sincere apology and acquiescence to his just demand—and not because of the leash law, but because of the plain ethics of the situation at hand. Instead, in such moment, he abrogated his status as a man and became a dumb robot capable only of regurgitating some arbitrary, do-gooder law for no reason other than to put me on the defensive for what motive I don’t honestly know.

Of course, he didn’t receive the response he’s likely used to, which would probably amount to some form of embarrassed submission. Instead, I treated him to a harsh and obscene tongue lashing unlike any he has recent memory of.

Intuit this. We’ve lived on this street for six years and know everyone on it. During these six years, Rotor has played, off leash, on every homeowner’s lawn on this street, and to every homeowner’s delight and welcome. For two years I’ve been walking down this street, my street, and on this day, some numbskull whom I’ve never laid eyes on in my life comes along to inform me of some arbitrary law I don’t give one damn wit about, and I’m supposed to be anything but openly hostile?

Right. Not now; not ever.

I wonder if we’ll ever learn.

(link: McQ)