View 757 Wednesday, January 09, 2013

I had eye exams today and that used up not only the day but most of my energy, which was a bit of a surprise. I didn’t think I tire that easily. I did get more done on the California Sixth Grade Reader, including some important notes on what I will have to say in the Introductions. Two introductions, actually, one to parents or teachers or who will be ‘assigning’ this to students, and one direct to the students who didn’t ask for this and will, if my memories of my reactions to such things has any relationship to the modern world, wonder why they are being stuck with this thing full of long poems and stories written a long time ago. Who the bleep cared about this stuff?

To which the only real answer is, maybe you should. If you can learn how to get both pleasure and some wisdom from tales and poetry, you’ll have a lot more fun in life. Learning from your own experiences is better than not learning, but learning from stories told about other people is even better than that. It’s not painless – that is if you do it right, some stories will be painful – but emotions experienced from reading prose and poetry are a lot less painful than if you’d made the same mistakes or had been dealt the same bad hand by life. And, by gollies, sometimes you have fun. Sometimes it can be pleasurable. But until you know something of the rules and have some experience at it, you won’t get much from Horatius at the Bridge, or The King of the Golden River.

Since most – not all, but most – of the kids who will find themselves reading this book will be smart, I can talk to them. I grew up smart. And I didn’t learn as much as I could have. Neither will the modern students, but you can at least be aware that people just like you, smart, understanding how to ace things at school without working, can wish they had the chance to get more out of their educations than they did. Not that I haven’t done pretty well over all, what with best sellers and having been in on some pretty important stuff; but I could have done better, and had more fun at it while I was doing it.

And I can still recite a bunch of long poems from memory, and you’d be astonished at how good it can make you feel to realize you can still do that.

Anyway, that’s out of my notebook from my hike and I’ll try to turn it into talk from a Dutch uncle. Maybe someone will listen.

I’m also making notes on why parents should care about old stories written long long ago, and big old poems that take forever to get the story across. Like The Courtship of Miles Standish, which has in fact a whacking good story and a real romance as well told as any Harlequin Romance ever was, and why Longfellow chose to use so many words to tell it can’t easily be explained – but once you see why he did it that way, you’ll know. I didn’t see that when I was first exposed to this in 5^th or 6^th Grade out in Capleville. After all, I could read all of the thing in a day or so, and remember just about all of it; but it took me years to realize why good poets take so long to get to the point, and I’m not sure I can explain it to anyone. I can say there is a darned good reason, and you’ll be a lot happier for knowing it.

Once again notes, not the essay.

I need new glasses, of course – especially since my fall flat on my face a few weeks ago scratched my Photo-gray Trifocals – but with the new ones I’ll be back about as good as I was on distance, and plenty good enough at computer distances. Can still drive without being a menace. And while they will do the full exam with drops next week my cataracts don’t seem to be growing much. I’m glad of that. I confess sheer terror at the thought of cataract operations. My late friend Bob Bloch couldn’t drive at night after his, and really didn’t want to drive in the daytime. That was my gain, in that I tended to drive him places, such as to the Studio Grand Opening of Star Trek, and yes, that was a long time ago. We came out after seeing it for the first time (in company with a lot of other writers and Hollywood people) and Bob said “They used ever cliché in the book, and made them all work.” So I went home and set my alarm clock so I could get up and get my broker on the phone to say “Buy me some Fox.” Which turned out to be a good investment at the time.

School non-massacre

BLOUNTVILLE, Tenn. — An armed man was fatally shot by deputies Monday at an East Tennessee high school after he went inside and pointed a gun at the principal’s head, a sheriff said.

"There’s no doubt in my mind he went there to kill someone today," Sheriff Wayne Anderson said at a Monday afternoon news conference hours after the gunfire at Sullivan Central High School. "I don’t know who, and I don’t know why."

WJHL-TV reported that Anderson said a Tennessee Bureau of Investigation will likely determine the motive.

No students or teachers were hurt and school was dismissed at 10:30 a.m. EDT.

Anderson said Thomas Richard Cowan, 62, of Kingsport confronted a security officer Monday morning after entering the school about 9 a.m.

Cowan entered the school with a .380-caliber semiautomatic and a .25-caliber handgun in his back pocket, Anderson said. The sheriff said that after Cowan grabbed the principal, Melanie Riden, and pointed the semiautomatic at her head, student resource officer Carolyn Gudger pulled her gun on Cowan and moved the principal to safety.

Anderson said Gudger moved Cowan down the hall and away from the cafeteria to a science pod. When Sullivan County deputies arrived, they ordered the gunman to drop his weapon, and he allegedly pointed it in their direction. He then pointed it back toward the school resource officer, prompting deputies to fire, Anderson said.

http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2010/aug/30/man-shot-sullivan-central-high-school/

John Monahan

Another instance of the proposition that the best way to stop a bad guy with a gun is to have some good guys – or women — with guns.

And now back to work on the Reader. I am well aware that I owe you several mail bags. They’re pretty good, too.

View 757 Tuesday, January 08, 2013

I have been working on getting the California Reader into print, and also on fiction, so I have been a bit slow with commentary here, and also I have let the mail pile up. I’ll try to do some of the mail tonight. As usual it’s all very interesting: this site gets some of the best mail on the Internet. Alas, sometimes the sender has to be anonymous even to the point of my not being able to quote directly, but mostly it’s good arguments. Not all in agreement with me, which is fine.

For many years I have paid dues to AFTRA. I don’t do much in the way of paid radio or television commentary or performances, but once in a while I do and AFTRA collects for me. Overall I think I am ahead in that I get paid for some guest appearances that otherwise would be gratis; I suppose I have missed some opportunities too. For the most part I haven’t paid much attention; AFTRA hasn’t been as activist as some Hollywood unions. Last year AFTRA merged with the Screen Actors Guild, and I got a union card that says ONE UNION SAG-AFTRA.

Now I have a card that lets me vote in the Oscars, and I have been getting DVD’s of Oscar nominated films. They have dire warnings against sharing them or letting them out of my custody, with the implication that the FBI will put twenty agents on the case if I do. I’m sort of against piracy to begin with so that’s no burden.

I have a moral problem here. I will not have time to watch all the movies that ought to be considered for the Oscars; is it fair to vote for ones I like when there are others that might be a lot better? Of course I will vote. I don’t read all the science fiction novels written each year, or even all those nominated, but I vote when I think there’s a work worthy of SFWA’s Nebula, and I’ll employ the same criterion here.

One of the movies we got was ARGO, and we watched it the other night. The opening propaganda about Mossadegh and the Shah is standard hogwash. I suspect that if Iran could have a fair election now, the Pahlavi dynasty would probably be returned to power; the Shah’s government was certainly authoritarian but it was also a great deal more tolerant than what replaced it. But if you ignore the introductory political massaging, it’s a good movie, and not all that far from the way things actually went down. They manage to build tension well even though everyone watching has to know that eventually they’ll get away with it. If you like caper movies you’ll probably like this one.

I’ve spent the day working on the California Sixth Grade Reader – this is the reader that was standard in California public schools when California arguably had the best public school system in the world – which I will put up with commentary shortly. I’m adding a few items to it: in those days California built it’s textbooks largely out of public domain, and some important works that would have been in it if they hadn’t been expensive can be included now. Also, there are some poems that readers would have encountered in fourth and fifth grades in those days, and some of them should be in here as part of preparation for works that are included.

It’s not all that much work, but it is a bit time absorbing. I’ve let this slide for years, and that’s not fair. Given the state of our public schools we need some decent reading materials out there. There’s a lot of Western Civilization that ought not be lost, but which is fading from our collective consciousness. This is one book that will help connect the next generation to those that came before. At some point the education system collapse can’t continue – if something can’t go on forever it will stop – but recovering from the rot that our public education system has become will not be easy.

It won’t be all that easy. In 1914 when this reader was standard in California, something like half the people of this country were involved in agriculture, farming, food processing, food distribution, and other occupations related to food production and distribution. Now that’s a much smaller number because the productivity of our agriculture and food processing system has so greatly increased.

People then moved from agriculture into manufacturing; but manufacturing productivity grows yearly – Moore’s Law directly affects electronics and computers, but that affects productivity of everything else – and fewer and fewer people are needed to do that.

Western Civilization once inspired people. Something needs to do that for the future. Perhaps that will be something new, but it seems important that we don’t throw away all our cultural heritage while we try to figure out what it is.

And it’s dinner time.

View 757 Monday, January 07, 2013

When I first heard the name Brennan as nominee for head of the CIA my failing memory brought up the image of L. Paul Brennan, the proconsul who disbanded the Iraqi Army and brought about the end of order in Iraq after the American conquest there. Fortunately it was my failing memory: John Brennan is a different Brennan entirely.

I doubt anyone else is as absent minded as I am, but just in case…

If the purpose of the President is to disengage from the Middle East, Mr. Chuck Hegel is probably the right one to do it. This appointment to Secretary of Defense has a number of implications. Logically it would mean we will concentrate on developing domestic energy supplies – real ones, not windmills and ground based solar panels – but logic is not always the best predictor of US policy.

(Regarding windmills and solar panels: they can be useful and effective for particular uses. But the wind doesn’t blow all the time and the sun doesn’t shine at night, and you can’t use unpredictable energy sources for baseline power generation. 0

I am hearing that the President has told the Speaker that we no longer have a spending problem: the problem in spending was caused by health care mismanagement and ObamaCare will fix that. We still have a revenue problem; we need more taxes on wealthy income. We can use that money to reduce the deficit. There isn’t a spending problem, but there is a revenue problem.

There is a great deal to write about today, and I’ll get to it, but it’s time for a walk.

PROOF of Senility.  The luckless proconsul who disbanded the Iraqi Army was L Paul Bremer, not Brenner, as I should have seen when I looked it up with Google – I did, I did, I really did –  ah well. The horrible part of this is that while I could not think of any reason why he would do so, I couldn’t reject out of hand that the President might appoint Bremer to be CIA Director. Horrible.  I seem to run toward absent mindedness lately, but I can still get some work done.

It was a very good walk. Sable is lively and you wouldn’t know there is anything wrong. She limps a bit, but she was eager to go on further rather than turn back home; which is good for all of us. We’ve been cutting our walks short.

I am working on the introduction and commentaries on the California Sixth Grade Reader. This has been a project that took a great deal longer than I intended, but we are in the final stages. The book is public domain; I will put up the eBook edition for a low price. At one time this was perhaps the best Sixth Grade Reader in the United States; we’ll get to that in the introduction. Thanks to Rick Hellewell and John Vogt for getting it to the point where I can finish it, and particularly to Rick for bugging me to get it done. It’s an important thing to be published. It is infinitely better than any middle school reader in general use now that I am aware of. Perhaps there are some better in circulation among some communities but I don’t know of a public school reader that’s better. For that matter I don’t know of many that are competent or even acceptable. The next step would be to add some modern stories to the collection – after all this was published in 1914 – but any sixth grader will be better off for having read this before tackling ‘modern’ stories written for 7^th grade and above.

And I had better get back to work on it.

View 756 Friday, January 04, 2013

One reason for not doing breaking news is that unless you have original sources you have no idea of what is really happening. You can’t rely on journalism, or at least not on what you can find with standard on-line search engines.

Yesterday the news was full of reproaches for the Republicans for not voting in the Senate-passed bill for the relief of the victims of Hurricane Sandy. My local Fox News station had a live interview with Republican Representative Peter King denouncing the House Republicans for putting off the vote. Governor Christie was even more vehement. The Republicans were being petty and vindictive, they did not like the Northeastern states, and that’s why they were doing this to the victims of the hurricane. Usually conservative talk show hosts joined in the chorus. There were no serious reasons for not supporting the bill already passed by the Senate. It had to be pure meanness.

This morning’s Wall Street Journal informs us that the $60 Billion Relief Bill which the Republicans refused to vote on contained considerable pork:

Look at some of what was in the $60 billion bill: $150 million for Alaskan fisheries; $2 million for roof repair at the Smithsonian in Washington; and about $17 billion for liberal activists under the guise of "community development" funds and so-called social service grants. Far from being must-pass legislation, this is a disgrace to the memory of the victims and could taint legitimate efforts to deal with future disasters.

California Republican Darrell Issa had it right when he told Fox News that "They had the opportunity to have a $27- to $30-billion legit relief package, packed it with pork, then dared us not to vote on it."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323374504578219733538204830.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

A $9 Billion Relief Bill was passed by the House this morning. It is a pure relief bill without funds for Alaskan fisheries (one does wonder why Alaskan fisheries were in a bill for relief of New York and New Jersey), and the various pork allocations in the original bill will have to be voted on in a separate action.

Of course it’s possible that the Senate will restore the Bill to its full $60 Billion magnificence and send it back to the House along with a media storm of contempt for the House for being prejudiced against New York and New Jersey. I will not be surprised if that happens.

We have now gone over the fiscal cliff, sort of, and not gone there, sort of. The President got a tax raise on”the rich”, as well as a 2% tax raise on everyone with a job, all without having to make any spending cuts whatever. The US continues to borrow about 40% of all the money it spends. The budget deficit continues to grow.

Note that the tax increases the President demands are on income, not on wealth. The effect of this is to prevent anyone not already rich from having any hope of becoming rich, while not changing the fortunes of those already rich. Someone must pay for entitlements: let it be those who want to become rich, not those who already are.  If you are born rich you may be able to graduate from a major university without owing tuition debts. If you are not born rich, or your parents are on wages which might be high enough to pay your tuition were it not for the income taxes but cannot do it now, you will come out into the world with a lifetime debt. Unless you are part of the hereditary aristocracy. Many colleges allow free tuition for children of tenured faculty members.

Salve Sclave.

Note that there is an addendum to the “rape fatwa” story in yesterday’s view. That is, I put in additional material after the initial publication.

My local Fox News station seems to think that the most important story is one of a pornographic film made in about the year 2000 that features a young looking girl, still unidentified, who may or may not be under the age of 18 (which is the legal age of consent in California). Federal agents found from the video that this took place in the San Fernando Valley, and local police agents took over, along with an appeal to the public. The daughter of the older woman in the video was found. She claims that the girl, said to be 13 years old by a medical examiner from the pictures, was an 18 year old addicted public prostitute known to everyone in the neighborhood, and that her mother (also a prostitute) and the unidentified girl were hired by the man in the film. The news continues to break. Resources continue to be added to the hunt. There has been an arrest. The US Attorney for this area is preening on the air. The girl has not yet been identified, but the film was made in Encino. The Department of Justice is sparing no expense in this matter. A charge has been made against John and Jane Doe for conspiracy to make child pornography. They could get fifteen years. The US Attorney says he may even be able to get 30 years. He has an affidavit from a credentialed pediatrician who says the unidentified girl in the picture is 13 years old. An arrest was made in the middle of the night, and the investigation goes on, no expenses spared. The US Attorney preens. Stay tuned.

For those wondering, I am not in favor of kiddie porn videos, but I do not see this as the kind of crime that needs a great deal of attention from the Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agency; it would seem to me there are far more pressing problems for the understaffed ICE than ten year old videos of a young woman ho may or may not have been victimized, but who has yet to be identified or come forward to complain about her mistreatment – and if she did come forward it’s a matter for the state of California where the crime took place. I have stories indicating that the current, on-going sex slave trade continues and there are insufficient resources to do anything about it.

There is also a search for a cartoonist who made a video sex film featuring a girl said to be 15 years old. The girl is a puppet. It is said to be important to find him, presumably for torturing electrons. Apparently that hunt is not one in which no expenses are to be spared.

We have a number of unsolved gang murders in Los Angeles. There is no word on the resources to be devoted to these matters. There are also accusations that the police have used their authority to obtain sex from undercover informants for letting them turn informant rather than being arrested and put into the system. One of the officers was said to show up at the woman’s apartment, drunk, at frequent intervals saying she had not done enough for him lately. The officers have been sent home with pay, although one is said to be in Las Vegas at the moment. The Police Union is upset that there has been an announcement that there is an investigation: the announcement is a violation of the rights of the police. After all these were drug addict prostitutes, and this has been going on for years, and you can’t believe these people, and Internal Affairs didn’t think they could be prosecuted, and…

Of course people make up stories about the police all the time, and it is important to protect the police from that sort of thing; but it is also important that flagrant abuse of authority be discouraged. Endless investigations with neither announcement nor charges don’t accomplish much.

In New York a court has ruled that a citizen who gave the finger to his wife while driving can sue the police who stopped him and arrested him on suspicion of domestic violence: the Court ruled that the gesture is an age old symbol of insult, and it isn’t illegal to make that gesture to your wife, so the police had no cause to chase him down and arrest him.

In Kansas the state is suing a male sperm donor who, apparently as a favor, donated sperm to a lesbian couple who wanted to have a baby. They have since separated and the birth mother is unable to support the child. The sperm donor father is now being sued for child support. He is, after all, the actual father of the child. This may or may not prompt some attention to the legal implications of same sex marriage. Had the lesbian couple been married, would that have transferred the obligations of fatherhood to the spouse who did not bear the child?

Isn’t following breaking news fun?

I confess that I have been depressed since the election. That is a mistake of course. The world goes on, and the principles haven’t changed.

http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/336808/greens-attack-mariculture-robert-zubrin?pg=3

Some years ago I pointed out that there were good reasons to believe that causing plankton blooms could both reduce the CO2 atmospheric content and also increase the food supply. Apparently the Haida have discovered this and have used the technique to increase the salmon available (the tribe has traditional fishing rights). Apparently the professional greens do not like this. Think of that….