Today is scheduled to be the end of the shuttle program. There is some happy talk about future space missions — when President Bush started the process to decommission the shuttle fleet, it was bases on the moon; now that President Obama has scuttled the moon bases, it’s private space flight. But, I get the feeling that we as a country are simply finished with space flight for the foreseeable future. It’s like the talk of a long distance relationship when you and your high school sweetheart go off to college. Maybe your intentions are good, but in all likelihood, the relationship is over.

I can understand the argument that space flight was expensive and maybe didn’t return a great deal. (I could argue with the latter – intensive government funded R&D on the space program had some remarkable returns). But, really, space flight is what made us great. When America finally crumbles into history (in the hopefully very distant future), if there are still humans around to do the remembering, one of the first things we’ll be remembered for is putting a man on the moon. In terms of achievements, that’s up there with Magellan circumnavigating the globe.

But, abandoning the space program seems to be part of a larger symptom. We’ve given up on being great and improving. Far from being committed to improving the things and society we’ve created, we seem resigned to the idea that we can’t even keep what we have, and that we should be content merely trying to slow the deterioration. Social Security, Medicare, a living wage, infrastructure, housing, education — all must be less than they were. We are not at present a people who could have put a man on the moon; at present, we couldn’t even build an interstate system or a transcontinental rail system. We can barely remain committed to maintaining the ones we have. I read too much science fiction, so I’m reminded of the decaying Empire based in Trantor from Isaac Asimov’s “Foundation” series. There is also a whiff of fatalism, as if we’ve Fallen from an Edenic state of grace and have been deteriorating ever since.

My tendency is to blame a commitment to low taxes on the ultra-wealthy above all else. Others tend to blame the rise of the rest of the world coupled with a laziness and softening of the American people. There is probably some truth to all of it (though, obviously, my belief is that the scale is tilted in favor of my tendency!). Nevertheless, I see a disturbing lack of optimism among Americans. As if we will never again attempt something transcendent because it would cost too much. As the man said, we know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

Update Someone sent me this graph of NASA’s budget as compared to what we spend on air conditioning in Iraq and Afghanistan:

I’m not going to indulge in one of those “I’m superior because I wasn’t paying attention to the Casey Anthony trial” posts. Obviously, it caught my attention to some degree and has prompted me to comment. It came to my attention when a local bug expert testified at the trial and our paper mentioned that fact. From there, the matter percolated into my consciousness one way or another. But, the extent of my “knowledge” is that the daughter of the accused died; the mother didn’t report it for a month; and, in the interim, she apparently went to bars and entered a hot body contest. That last detail is the tell, I suppose. Maybe it says that I’m superficial for remembering something so frivolous. Alternatively, it might be a major point of the exercise.

If this child had been the daughter of someone poor, non-white, and ugly would it have gotten the same coverage? Tipsy makes a point:

Everyone in the country seems to know what happened except the jury. Everyone in the country’s full of it.

The jury system is deeply flawed and unreliable, no doubt, but the press is worse. You, gentle reader, are the product the press “sells.” You’re not paying them anything, but they sell your eyes, ears, and every carnal passion to buyers called “advertisers.” And they’ll feed you poisonous junk food to make sure they’ve got a good supply of eyes, ears and passions to sell.

Goodlookingbabykillingsociopathmother is a very tasty dish, don’t you think? It’s right up there with Hornyashellfrenchbillionairerapist.

Let’s unpack that a little. The point about everyone in the country knowing what happened is very well taken. I am extremely skeptical of the jury system. You just don’t know what you’re getting when you put those twelve people in the box. You don’t know what they’re paying attention to. You don’t know if they understand the legal instructions they’re given; let alone inclined or able to apply those instructions. But anyone who has ever been part of a story that the media has reported knows that what gets reported sometimes bears only a nodding acquaintance with what actually transpired. That’s not usually through any kind of malfeasance of the reporter – things get lost in translation – but, sometimes it is. This is the same media that gave us the unrelenting drumbeat about Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq; and that was important. This is just titillation.

The point about what the media is selling I once saw summed up as “if you’re not paying, and you don’t know what’s being sold; it’s probably you.” That being the case, I think the fact that the mother wasn’t ugly was crucial to the story being reported. An unattractive person from a bad part of town wouldn’t have captured the eyeballs for advertisers. It would have been just another tale of misery.

What captured my attention enough to post was the vehemence of the response. It’s easy to talk big on the Internet, but it had the feel of a virtual lynch mob out there. “The jury done wrong; but we’re gonna git her!” Maybe the jury did do wrong; maybe Nancy Grace and the rest of the jackals did a great job of reporting and the Mom is guilty as sin. But I sure wouldn’t want to bet someone’s life on the accuracy of the reporting on something like that.

Evan Bayh’s latest job: Marathon Petroleum board of directors. (h/t xtrarant)

Doubtless this is another position for which he was selected because of his knowledge and sensible advice and totally not because of any political influence he might have. That would be laughable.

Lest we forget, recall Citizen Bayh’s sanctimonious exit from the Senate where he bemoaned the special interest influence and lack of public spirit.

Contemplation of the Fourth of July dovetails nicely with a book I’m reading at the moment entitled, The Fatal Shore: The Epic History of Australia’s Founding by Robert Hughes. The Declaration of Independence by the American colonies led, in a very real way, to the founding of Australia.

England, particularly London, did not have a good grip on its crime situation. Their own notions of liberty led them to resist a regularized police force. Due process given to the accused was relatively permissive. Detection was difficult. But, once convicted, the punishments were draconian — perhaps as a response to the difficulty in locating criminals and obtaining convictions. The privatized jail system they had was inadequate as well as being incredibly harsh and corrupt. And crime was rampant. The gap between those with property and those without had turned into a chasm as urbanization and industrialization started to take hold. Laws designed to protect property from the mob multiplied. But, in overcrowded London, the deterrent effect was questionable.

To relieve the pressure, the British had turned to a system of Transportation for convicts. There was a system that involved convicts taken to America and becoming indentured servants that apparently worked well enough. But, when the Americans declared their independence, they were understandably reluctant to continue serving as a dumping ground for British convicts. And, so, in 1787, Australia’s First Fleet set sail for Botany Bay. It was really a remarkable, almost baffling, undertaking. No Europeans had apparently been to Australia since, 17 years prior in 1770, Captain Cook had landed there. Undertaking the expense and risk to transport six shiploads of convicts (with five support ships) to the far side of the world — not entirely unlike a trip to the moon at the time — to dump your convicts in a place where their prospects were uncertain is perplexing to say the least. Per the Wikipedia article on the First Fleet:

This was one of the world’s greatest sea voyages — eleven vessels carrying about 1,487 people and stores[5] had travelled for 252 days for more than 15,000 miles (24,000 km) without losing a ship. Forty-eight people had died on the journey, a death rate of just over three per cent. Given the rigours of the voyage, the navigational problems, the poor condition and sea-faring inexperience of the convicts, the primitive medical knowledge, the lack of precautions against scurvy, the crammed and foul conditions of the ships, poor planning and inadequate equipment, this was a remarkable achievement.

I was also interested to read that, around this time, Jeremy Bentham was pushing his idea of a penitentiary model called the Panopticon; something I’ve mentioned in these parts before. The idea there was to create a ring of cells around a centralized tower. The cells would be back lit to be visible from the center, but the prisoners couldn’t tell at any given time when a guard was watching them; the result being that they would have to act as if they were being watched at all times and, therefore, their behavior would improve. (Incidentally, I’ve heard this rationale suggested as the survival value added to civilizations by religion — an omniscient, watchful God makes the society’s members act better even when alone, thereby making adherence to the society’s laws more prevalent.) Bentham tried to get one of Australia’s first governors to promise to build a Panopticon in the fledgling prison colony. It didn’t happen – they had their hands full trying to scratch out bare survival, let alone build a modern prison facility.

At the time of America’s founding and Australia’s colonization, English speaking people were very concerned about the rights of property and how to structure society and criminal justice to protect those rights. England, Australia, and the United States have all turned into relatively peaceful, prosperous places. So, maybe we all resolved these questions in more or less satisfactory ways. What we don’t want, is to create such disparities in wealth that we return to the rampant criminality of the 18th century London lower class. We don’t have anywhere to send our criminals anymore.

Re-posting this, originally posted six years ago.

Every 4th of July, I like to reread the Declaration of Independence. This helps me remember what the Founders had in mind when they set forth on their insurgency against King George, and it reminds me of what lies at the root of all that makes this country great. As you may recall, the Declaration begins:

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. –That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. –Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

It’s this breaking of bonds, and the reasons therefore, that make the 4th of July important. It’s not just thanking the military or our forefathers. It’s not just the flag. It’s not just the fireworks. These are all part and parcel of the larger idea.

The larger idea is that individuals are self-determining beings. Liberty is their natural right and their natural condition. Authority should not be suffered solely for it’s own sake. Proper government is designed and maintained by the citizenry, it is not revealed and handed down from on high.

I am thankful that the founding fathers were products of the political culture of the Enlightenment and not of our own day. I cannot imagine that our current Representatives would pledge their lives, their fortunes, and their honor to boldly break from Authority that no longer serves its purpose: to secure the rights of the citizens.

So, when you are at the parades and the picnics, revel in the patriotism, thank the troops, love our country, but think about the Declaration and the principles that are more important than any of those things. The full text follows.

[Read more…]

For too long, brothers and sisters, we have toiled under the oppressive lash of cursive writing. No more! The Indiana Department of Education is removing cursive as required subject matter for Indiana’s schools.

My view of this as a positive development is almost entirely due to the fact that my cursive writing is, and always has been, horrible. My otherwise spotless elementary report cards were marred by the handwriting grade. (Except in the case of my 5th grade teacher, Mrs. Busick, who simply declined to mess up my report card by giving me a grade in that subject.) As soon as they let me, I went back to printing; and once I learned how to type, that’s all she wrote – so to speak.

Others might find cursive useful in some fashion, but for me, it’s about as useful as my appendix. In the distant past, it probably held some utility, but at present, it’s mostly a neutral curiosity that occasionally causes severe medical problems.

Good riddance.

I had a high school history teacher who, periodically, would draw three circles on the chalkboard representing the three branches of government: executive, legislative, and judicial. Depending on what era in history we were looking at, the respective circles would be bigger or smaller. Possibly there was a better visual representation to be had, but the basic notion was that, where one branch refused or declined to act, the other ones would expand into the vacuum.

Speaking of three rings, Congress has largely looked like a circus for the past generation or so. And that, as much as anything else I believe, is why we have seen the Presidency and the Supreme Court looming larger in our lives. This might also be why “limited government” is mostly a fantasy — at least if its proponents seek to achieve it through gridlock and inaction. The branches would have to affirmatively limit themselves and the other branches. Inaction simply leads to one of the other branches stepping into the breach.

Nick Hedrick, writing for the Lafayette Journal & Courier, has an article about a good cause spearheaded by some Lafayette residents. Mario Marathon 4 is underway.

Brian Brinegar, John Groth, Chris Deckard, Nate Jones, Bobby Arnold, Shanna Brinegar, Sundeep Rao, Ben Cotton, Jed Johnson, Emily Blue, and Stephanie Deckard are playing Mario games non-stop for a few days to raise money to benefit the Child’s Play Charity, “a game industry charity dedicated to improving the lives of children with toys and games in our network of over 60 hospitals worldwide.”

Good people, good cause, and good games. So, consider clicking over to watch the event and maybe make a donation or two. Even if they are a bunch of goddamn nerds.

I love the information age. An excerpt from an e-book Google makes available has some information on my great, grand uncle, Woodburn Masson (brother of my great-grandfather), an Indianapolis attorney in the late 19th and early 20th centuries:

Woodburn Masson in his youth early became dependent upon his own resources. He had ambition, courage and persistence, and worked his own way in one of the most exacting of professions, defraying the expenses of his technical education and ever placing a true value upon men and affairs. It is thus pleasing to note that today he is numbered
among the representative members of the Indianapolis bar and is one of the highly esteemed citizens of his native citv.

Woodburn Masson was born in Indianapolis, on the 9th of July, 1869, and is a son of James P. and Eliza T. (Ross) Masson, the former of whom was born in Pennsylvania and the latter in Indiana.’ The father, who was a commercial traveler by vocation, died when his son, of this review, was an infant, and the widowed mother continued her residence in Indianapolis, where she reared her three sons and one dausrhter with all of self-abnegation and zealous devotion. She was summoned to the life eternal on the 15th of March, 1908, and her memory is revered
by all who came within the sphere of her gentle and gracious influence.

He whose name initiates this article continued his studies in the public schools of Indianapolis until he was fifteen years of age, when he found it incumbent upon him to assume practical responsibilities, as his mother had met with the loss of her savings and the returns from insurance policies held by her deceased husband, owing to the failure of the bank in which she deposited her funds. Under these conditions young Woodburn Masson devoted himself assiduously to learning stenography and typewriting, and to this line of work he devoted his attention nearly three years after becoming proficient in the same. He then began the study of law, in the office of the general attorney of the Lake Erie & Western Railroad. in Indianapolis, and later he completed a course in the Cincinnati Law School in the class of 1895. In 1891 he was admitted to the bar of his native city and state, where he has since continued in the active work of his chosen profession and where he has so utilized his fine natural and technical powers as to gain a position of prominence and a worthy reputation in his chosen vocation, to which his devotion and loyalty have been of the most insistent order.

From 1891 until 1894 he was assistant to the general attorney of the Lake Erie & Western Railroad, and since the expiration of that period he has devoted his attention to general practice in the State and Federal courts, in which he has won many decisive victories as a trial lawyer, while as a counselor he is known to be fortified with a broad and exact
knowledge of the law and to have marked facility in the application of such information.

The political views of Mr. Masson are indicated by the zealous service which he has rendered to the cause of the Democratic party, and as a citizen none could be more public-spirited or more zealous in the promotion of good government and needed reforms. In all measures and enterprises tending to make for good citizenship and civic and material progress, he lends a ready co-operation, and his interest in his native city is deep and abiding. He and his wife hold membership in the Meridian Street Methodist Episcopal Church.

In the year 1904, was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Masson to Miss Nellie G. Wells, daughter of Dr. Merritt Wells, the oldest resident dentist of Indianapolis, and Mrs. Masson is popular in connection with the best social activities of her home city.

—Jacob Piatt Dunn, Greater Indianapolis, the Histories, the Industries, the Institutions at 781-782 (1910)