Lucy and Me
My niece Rachel, when she was little, dubbed me Ant Ant.
So now Lucy has kicked me upstairs: I’m Great Ant Ant!
(That solid, reassuring wall of father on the left is Lucy’s dad, Matt.)
Beautiful
Wow. Ksenyia Simonova, of the Ukraine, is an incredible artist. Astounding how much emotion can be conveyed in just a few lines of sand. And so transitory; each image lasts, complete, for but a few short moments, before another is constructed on its foundation.
[Update: Oops, my bad. I knew this looked familiar, but I didn’t look far enough back in the Ambiance prior posts. Randy spotted her work first, 3 weeks ago! Sorry about that, Randy! I was swamped that week and didn’t have time to watch it then, then I saw somebody else post about it today at another blog.]
Duetto Buffo Di Fue Gatti
On a much lighter note, sit back and enjoy this Rossini duet .
(Via Eclecticity)
Parting Words
[He’s sitting by the bed as she wakes up]
Are you leaving?
Yes. It’s time for me to go.
I want to go, too.
I’ll pack you a bag.
[smiles] You know what I mean.
Yes, I do.
[silence]
You need to eat more.
I can’t.
Can’t or won’t?
I want to throw up when I do.
You should tell M. [her son]
Why bother?
I’m afraid I already told him.
Oh, well…
If you don’t eat, you’ll get weaker.
I hope so.
I thought so. [places his hand on hers]
Are you sure?
Yes, I’m sure. It’s OK.
[silence]
Like Father Like Son
Charlie & Daddy (a.k.a Danny Miller) enjoying their afternoon nap at home.
Photo by Mommy (a.k.a Kendall Miller)
Click HERE for the further adventures of Charles Oliver Thomas Miller.
Memorial Concert
More selections from this 1964 performance in Sydney, Australia below the fold:
Marital aids and shower heads
Ok, I asked Amba to go ahead and give me an account because I have a serious post I want to make, which I’ll do later this evening. But I decided to start off with something a bit more fun light-hearted. What’s the difference between a sex toy and a shower head?
Few political factions in the U.S. can lay great claim to intellectual consistency these days. Mutual hypocrisy rather abounds. When Democrats were uncivil to President Bush and called him a liar, Republicans were all about civility and decorum. When Republicans were uncivil to President Obama, roles switched, and Republicans spoke of speaking truth to power and the need to fight effectively, while Democrats suddenly rediscovered the need for civility and decorum.
But even among more civil debaters and on more specific issues, one can see some really inconsistent thinking. Let’s look at two issues.
Eugene Volokh brings us news of a court challenge to an Alabama statute which bans the sale of devices “useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs.” Prof. Volokh believes the Supreme Court will either decline to hear the case or will uphold the law, though it would seem fairly at odds with current jurisprudential trends, both in light of the Griswold case on contraceptives and certainly the more recent Lawrence case on privately conducted homosexual activity. The left-leaning commenters, as one would expect, decry the law as prudery, and speak in glowing terms of the right to be left alone, to do what one will in one’s own bedroom.
On the flip side, let’s look at shower heads and toilets. I’m informed that shower heads have, in fact, been used as a “marital aid” by some women, and a number of public conservation campaigns make discretely sexual suggestions to “shower with a friend!” to save water, so this seems rather analogous to the sex toy ban. Since 1994, EPA regulations have banned from sale all shower heads which put out more than 2.5 gallons per minute of water. The Energy Policy Act of 1992 also imposed a 1.6 gallons per flush limit on most residential toilets. Again, those on the left are largely in favor of these regulations, while those on the right are against.
So here’s the question. How can you have a constitutionally-protected “privacy interest” in buying “devices useful primarily for the stimulation of human genital organs,” but not have a constitutionally-protected privacy interest in the type of showerhead or toilet you buy for the single most private room of any house?
War of Lies
Many conservatives adore Joe Wilson for shouting “You lie!” at President Obama, but some — some of the same ones — have no qualms about using untruth and distortion themselves as a weapon in what they see as an all-out war.
When a conservative (David Frum) points out that another conservative (Glenn Beck) has deployed an untruth, a third conservative (David Horowitz) defends the tactic. In Frum’s account:
Horowitz agrees that Beck’s attack on Sunstein was false. Yet that falsehood does not worry Horowitz. The country is “under assault.” (As the broadcaster Mark Levin has said, President Obama is “literally at war” with the American people.) In a war, truth must yield to the imperatives of victory. Any conservative qualms about the untruth of Beck’s defamation of Sunstein amounts to “appeasement” – an appeasement that will end with the left decapitating the right. [Frum then editorializes sardonically:] This is the language and logic of Leninism. There is no truth or falsehood comrades, there is only service to the revolution or betrayal of the revolution.
How can you justify using the same tactics you decry in your opponent? It’s simple: “We’re right and they’re wrong!” “The end justifies the means!”
But that’s what both sides are saying. That’s what both sides believe.
I don’t want either one governing me!!
Man, if I were one of our enemies, I’d be rubbing my hands together exultantly to see so many Americans indulging in the lethal luxury of a soccer-hooligan-level war with each other.
Make Of It What You Will
The progressive blogs are aflutter over this RWJF-sponsored poll (H/T Klein). I’m not a big believer in the public option but I found the results interesting.
Worrying Race Like an Old Bone
The discussion between me and my bro continues, although I don’t know that either one of us is saying anything new or different, prompted by MoDo’s column and James Pinkerton’s response to it.
David:
See, I think there’s a difference between shouting “racism” — which I agree these days is little more than just a sharp object to throw under the tires of your opponent — and realizing what it is and actually, quietly doing something about it.
There’s a difference between pointing at someone who’s intolerant and shouting Bigot!, and recognizing what you’re up against and either negotiating with it or (preferably) kicking its fucking ass.
There’s a huge problem, which I identified (a couple of days before Dowd): there’s a significant minority in this country that may just be too uncomfortable with a black man in the White House. You don’t shake your head and tsk-tsk at that, but you do have to either proceed carefully in tacking huge, ambitious projects with a narrow majority, or you have to kick ass and take names. Obama has vacillated somewhere in the middle, which I think has emboldened conspiracy theorists and wingnuts who now see themselves as the base of the Republican Party.
I think Obama missed a golden opportunity to kick ass, right then and there. He looked almost as shocked as Pelosi behind him did (I loved how Biden just looked down and shook his head in disgust).
I wish he’d looked at Wilson and said, “No, Congressman, I’m not lying. I’m telling the truth. And later in the speech I’m going to talk about ways to approach this significant issue without losing sight of the civility needed to reach a positive solution. I hope you’ll pay special attention to that portion of my talk.”
Or something like that. Call the bastard out! Be the velvet hammer! Then come out swinging in the aftermath of the talk.
Because if you don’t, you lend credence to people who cloak fear of The Other in all kinds of other goofy shit.
The only reason that discussion of racism would be useful would be to call the collective bluff of people who think a black man in the White House must be sinister. Go after their bullshit and compel them to – er – call a spade a spade.
Me:
Heh heh.
What’s really upsetting me is that it’s interfering after all, with his ability to function as President. Others can refuse to deal with him because of it, and he can take cover and be failure-proof behind it. In my opinion, it was a huge mistake (and pure Chicago-style politics: whatever might give you a hold over your opponent) to ever use it, even by implication, to discredit opposition to the health plan. The health plan is scary to conservatives ALL BY ITSELF and would be equally so with a white big-government-friendly liberal pushing it. Implying with a broad brush that racism is behind the opposition (which a lot of Obama’s supporters are resorting to, even if he isn’t) drags race into the foreground instead of giving it a withering look and banishing it to the background where it belongs. Frankly, I don’t give a shit whether, what, as much as 20% of the country can’t stand having a black man in the white house (sexual implication intended), as long as the Secret Service keeps them and their guns far away from him. He should be ignoring them, writing them off as hopeless dinosaurs, and having an honest discussion (as he keeps claiming he’s having) with the people who have an honest disagreement with him. But he is a Democratic machine politician, beholden to a base that wants a public option badly enough to force it on the near-half of the country that doesn’t. Race aside, his mandate isn’t big enough for that and he’s going to have to compromise, or else things are going to get even worse than they already are.
It’s the failure to recognize the legitimate (even if you think it’s misguided) opposition to the health plan per se — in the belief that it is NOT gonna be deficit-neutral, for starters, no way — that I find dishonest and politics as usual. Racists should be IGNORED, not used as human shields. All this talk of race is a DISTRACTION from that and those who treat it as anything else are guilty of helping to inflame it. I even think the convenience of that could be one reason the backroom boys and girls of the Democratic party decided to elect him.
David:
Or, it could be repeatedly used as a smokescreen by far-right Republicans (or Whatevers) behind which to hide a determination to make him fail at the good he could really do — not because he’s black, but because he’s a Democrat.
I really do think in a weird way that the invocation of race as an issue is something that the right is encouraging, because they see it as drawing the scared to their side — regardless of how kooky the scared may be. After all, what does it matter who’s on your side, as long as there’s more of you than there are of them?
There’s nothing more cynical than a machine politician. Problem is, machines come in all colors. I don’t think Republicans are focused on the evils of a public option — where were they over most of the past quarter century, as this problem was getting worse and worse? W’s prescription benefit was the only attention health care really got from Republicans — until now. That they missed their chance to craft reform without a public option — especially after the 2002 mid-term elections — and to create a new era of fiscal responsibility, has now caused them to want to undermine, at all costs, the only, or best, hope we’ve had at some kind of reform, in our lifetime.
Now it’s not gonna happen — not in any meaningful way. And if it’s not meaningful, it means it won’t keep the problem from getting worse.
But of course, if it gets worse on a Democrat’s watch, that’s OK.
Me:
This is why the people in what’s so often called, with contempt, by both sides, “the mushy middle” should not be written off. They’re the only ones who care more about getting something done that everyone can live with than about beating the other side.
Ambiance 