Month: November 2010

Drum isn't onboard: 

Let's face it: if you pick your jurisdiction right you can probably find a district court judge to rule just about anything unconstitutional. It would be easy, for example, to find a district court judge somewhere to say that the healthcare reform law was unconstitutional. If this happened in 2013 and President Palin decided not to appeal the ruling, thus overturning the law, what would we think of this? Not much, and rightfully so. A district court judgment is just flatly not sufficient reason to overturn an act of Congress.

"I know politicians that I like, but I don’t know any politicians who I could imagine being. I have sympathy for politicians, but I have no empathy. I can’t get inside their heads. Who the fuck would want to do this?" – P.J. O'Rourke

Jason Mazzone sees a path forward should Obama have the courage to take it. What the president should say to Congress:

[T]he Department of Justice will continue its current efforts in court to defend DADT from constitutional challenge only if doing so reflects the will of Congress. DOJ attorneys have filed with the Ninth Circuit a notice of appeal from the district court’s judgment. According to the schedule the Ninth Circuit has set, the government’s appellate brief is due on January 24, 2011. The DOJ will file a brief and continue with the appeal if prior to January 24, 2011, Congress affirms in a concurrent resolution that it supports the continued defense of DADT in court.

If neither the 111th nor 112th Congress adopts a concurrent resolution to this effect prior to January 24, 2011, on that date the DOJ will withdraw its appeal and the district court’s injunction will take permanent effect. 

A reader writes:

I don't think it's entirely accurate to describe something as extensively bred and manipulated as marijuana as "a naturally occurring weed," any more than it would be to say the same of the latest prize-winning hybrid tea rose. You're talking about something intensively cultivated, messed with, genetically tweaked. If it were legal, most of those fancifully-named varietals in the dispensaries would have patents attached to them, just like all the mint varietals at, say, Richters.com, an herb specialist in Canada.

Speaking of Richters, here's what they have to say about opium poppies:

Because opium poppy seeds are used in baked goods and other foods, they are legal to possess and use in most countries. But growing the plants, even if only for seeds or as an ornamental flower, may not be strictly legal in many of those same countries. Still, a long history of cultivation in flower gardens suggests that authorities choose to overlook the plants as long as they are not grown for opium. If you have any concerns about the legal status of growing these poppies in your garden, please seek legal advice before planting.

There are lots of things Richters says it can't legally ship to the US. Some are just invasive pests (e.g. kudzu), but others are banned as psychotropic drugs of one kind or another. Whether this is just Richters being cagey, or an actual US government ban, I don't know. But it's simply not true that there's no legal cloud over other psychotropic plants. Peyote? Coca? "Magic mushrooms"? Ma huang?

And I don't get the significance of your "without processing" disclaimer. It is supposed to matter that all you need to do with MJ is set it on fire, as opposed to those tedious fermentation processes you have to use with hops and grapes, or whatever the hell is involved in making cocaine and heroin? What possible moral difference can that make?

Another passes along the above video and writes:

Botany of Desire has a fascinating segment on cannabis.  Starting at 12:30 they explain how cannabis has evolved.  "The key to that transformation was stripping away the rule of nature and replacing it with our own."

Another:

Regarding your statement that "we do not ban poppies in America, even though some could be processed for opium" – actually, poppies are illegal in the US, though it's weirdly and subjectively enforced. Michael Pollan wrote a great article about it.

Another:

We do not ban poppies generally, but we do ban opium poppies.  In 19th century America, opium poppy was a popular ornamental, and came in different colors.  It grows taller than other species of poppy, and gives a brilliant display of flowers.  Then growing it in your flower garden was banned.

As for poisonous mushrooms, many of them require tree partners to grow, and the cultivation techniques have not been worked out.  For example, try intentionally growing amanita phalloides, aka "the destroying angel" (severe liver damage in every bite! Delicious too.)  If you should succeed, you should try to get a masters thesis in botany out of it.  People have repeatedly tried and failed to grow morels, which are edible, delicious, and highly sought after by gourmets.  (I found some once in the woods and had them fried in butter.  Niiice.) 

Problem?  In nature, they grow symbiotically in the company of trees.  So, intentional cultivation of many species of poisonous mushrooms, or many non-poisonous species such as morels and truffles, is not the potential problem you make it out to be.  The mushrooms we do know how to cultivate came to be cultivated because people took the effort to figure it out due to market demands, and without fail, they are not the kind of mushrooms which form symbiotic relationships with plants.

Another:

You wrote, “We do not ban poison ivy, or inflict legal penalties for those who have it in their yards.” That is not entirely true. In Minnesota, for example, “noxious weeds” are banned by statute. Poison ivy and hemp are among the 11 designated plants (PDF). Landowners technically have a legal responsibility to eradicate. Of course, in reality, no one is ever punished for failing to spray poison ivy.

I understand that current marijuana crops are highly horticulturalized products. But my point remains: it can still exist as a simple weed. I stand corrected, however, on the banning of various plants, and vastly more informed on this whole topic because of Dish readers's knowledge and expertise. Thanks.

Jack Shafer advises MSNBC to just admit they're opinionated:

The best way for the network to exit the morass it's created is to stop pretending that Countdown and The Rachel Maddow Show are straight-news programs. Of course, there's plenty of straight news in both programs, just as straight news can be found in the New Republic, the Nation, the Weekly Standard, Mother Jones, the National Review, Reason, and other opinion magazines. But both anchors and both programs are so transparent about coming at the news from a liberal angle that it's the network's failing—not theirs—that the shows aren't billed as partisan takes on the news, as the magazines listed above are.

A reader writes:

In comparing non-fundamentalist Christians with agnostics, your reader makes a couple of assertions that he can't support, and that, frankly, illustrate an annoying "Christian" pride that many of the faithful, fundamentalist or not, can't seem to shake.

First, who says agnostics "do not seem to care about the source of the mystery?"  I would love to know what this universe, and our place in it, is all about.  I'm sure there's an answer.  I just don't think Jesus has anything to do with it.  Though I could be wrong.

Second, while your reader has a lot to say about Christian humility, he, exhibits little of it himself.  Not only does he know that I'm not serious about the essence of this mystery we all share, but he knows he'll see God's face. That is hubris, not humility.

Another writes:

I think your reader's characterization of agnostics is wrong. When I was in high school, I had to explain my agnosticism to another Andrew who was a buddy of mine and a Christian. The best I could come up with was, "I don't perceive God in the world around me." I think for some, possibly for most agnostics, agnosticism is no more an evasion of God or the divine than total colourblindness is an evasion of rainbows. It's a more fundamental lack of the experiences that faith in god or belief in the divine is built upon.

When I first read the post, the author came across as arrogant in the extreme, particularly in his conclusions. Considering it again, however, it's understandable, because for a deeply religious person, the idea that there are people who have no experience of God must not be an easy thing to process. It must be rather like saying, "There are people who will never experience love or joy or comfort". I can see it being far easier to handle people willfully rejecting God, than people who live their lives cut off from it.

I may be entirely wrong about the thought process, but it seems to be why a rather sharp battle line is drawn between believers and unbelievers. For far too many on both sides, there's simply no other explanation countenanced than "they must be willfully delusional."

Another:

I’m a paid singer in the choir of a local Catholic church. Our pastor is an wonderful and wise old fellow Irishman. When I brought this up, he just said “If you’re humble, and really want to find out, we say that God will find you”.

When a writer gets a fatal brain tumor, it's one thing. When he gets one near the part of his brain that deals with language, his very words die as he does. This is a gripping tale of decline, and at times reads like the best poetry:

My experience of the world is not made less by lack of language but is essentially unchanged.

This is curious.

"Would it be imaginable that people should never speak an audible language, but should still say things to themselves in the imagination?" Ludwig Wittgenstein

One way, but not the other way, but sometimes in both ways.

Pure music I can do, narrative music I can't.

Film, I understand shape and colour but not story.

Poetry is still beautiful, taking me with it.

Pictures, I understand abstract but not story. But I can actually do much more still with pictures. This is my job.

My language works in ever decreasing circles. The whole of English richness is lost to me and I move fewer and fewer words around.

I cannot count. At all.

Marion and her embrace.

Ground, river and sea.

Eugene – his toys, his farm, his cars, his fishing game.

Getting quiet.

Names are going.

Writing, there is no voice.

Or, rather, writing is still there in its old form but it's gone quiet. It fluctuates and gets more difficult.

I can't understand what people say so clearly, what they mean, what they intend.

I can write, just about.

It's very difficult for me to talk at all (one way just hopes for sense and another way is total nonsense).

But all the same it's amazing what Marion can do, how it can still happen.

First of all it was scary; now it's all right; it is still, even now, interesting;

My true exit may be accompanied by no words at all, all gone.

The final thing. The illiterate. The dumb.

A reader writes:

You’ve got it with this post. I’m not a fan of the mythological language of the Bible, but in the New Testament Satan is called the Father of lies. That sums it up. Start believing one lie, because it makes you feel good, and then another, because it vindicates you in that never-ending argument that is going on in your head, and pretty soon the whole ground has shifted beneath your feet and you can’t tell any longer what’s what. Instructive: those who lie with the most vehemence do so in the name of the God their action of lying betrays. At least philosophically considered, God has always been the “ground” of truth.

Another writes:

It is not Republicans’ fault for telling these lies. It is their job to make the opposition look bad and win elections. It is the rest of the non-Fox media (if there is any left) for not telling the truth.

Another:

It seems to me your post on the “big lies” of Republican candidates and pundits demonstrates much of what is wrong with American politics. Do you really think that Charles Krauthammer, the entire staff of National Review, and a large percentage of the Republican Congressional delegation really do not believe what they are saying, but are spouting untruths for political advantage? Now they may be wrong, mistaken, deluded, whatever — but liars? Calling those with whom you disagree names is just the sort of thing which has become all too prominent in American politics in the last twenty years.

Another:

It’s incredible that such plain and obvious insights seem, in light of today’s prevailing narratives, so outrageously daring. Thank you for struggling on everyone’s behalf to show us what is right in front of our noses.

Another:

You know, I want to offer Republican friends the benefit of the doubt.

I want to conclude that the genesis of this hyperventilating against our very capable president isn’t because of his race or his party or his success in life.  I want to conclude they have seriously paid attention to Obama’s accomplishments, weighed the value of them, taken into consideration the dire circumstances our country faced as the Bush era was winding down, and then reasoned out thoughtful ideas in opposition or credible arguments for other actions that would have worked as well to help our country heal.  However, it appears to me that they, like sinners on a death bed, are, with suspicious suddenness, “concerned about deficit spending” and scared for their grandchildrens’ tax burden.  These are the same friends who, up until almost the night of Obama’s election, were happily chanting Cheney’s refrain, “Deficits don’t matter!”  But now they’ve got religion about balanced budgets as soon as a Democratic black man walks into the doors of the White House.

What I truly don’t understand is how my Republican friends, who are all middle class and generally college educated and able to read the newspaper or grasp tricky concepts and discuss them intelligently, are suddenly feeling threatened for millionaires, for Wall Street banks and execs, and for monolith health insurance companies, who are screwing them.  My friends act like they either don’t know this is happening or don’t mind one bit and suddenly, Obama is a villain taking away their freedom to be screwed by these heartless mega-corporations.  What’s up with that?

My Republican friends are also children of immigrants in the not too distant past.  Yet, they are currently reacting with increasing bigotry towards immigrants newer than themselves and people of color or of different tradition or religion, just since a Democratic black man became president.  How does this happen?  Suddenly, Obama’s policies, his sanity, his humanity, his energy, his intellect, his reasonableness, his nerve–none of that matters to my Republican friends.  His value is not even seen by them.  They won’t look at him.  They just listen to lies from the Media Lie Machine and brand him a socialist, while covering their bigotry with unspecified fluff, “I disagree with his policies.”  Or, “I believe he’s leading America down the wrong road.” 

Maybe Jon Stewart is right about our media being our immune system and how its defense of our country is broken and now everybody has excema.  Or maybe, it’s because a Democratic black man won the White House and my Republican friends can no longer hide their unresolved fear of people of color in positions of power.