The mark of the immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one.

This is a line from Wilhelm Stekel quoted in The Catcher in the Rye. I wish I had held on to it, but when I was a freshman in college, I recall reacting fiercely to this in an essay. I recall feeling at the time like it robbed me of something essential, something having to do with the right to go out in a blaze of glory if I chose. Forty has a hard time of remembering twenty, so I can’t explain, let alone justify, that feeling; but I do remember that it was strong, and it was visceral.

I am reminded of that feeling when I’ve been reading online the reaction of some people to the notion that, particularly in the wake of the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords they should abstain from gun and violence laden metaphors in their political rhetoric.

Now, before anyone gets the vapors at the suggestion that violent rhetoric is connected to this incident of violence, I will stipulate that I know nothing of the motives of the shooter, and I will further stipulate that her political opponents called only for metaphorical violence and not real violence. When Sarah Palin used crosshair imagery and “targeted” Congresswoman Gifford, she did not have a particular desire for actual bullets to be used. And when teapartiers talk about “Second Amendment solutions,” they are just being blowhards. And when they talked about political opponents being traitors, dictators and agents of tyranny, they were just talking out of their asses.

My personal suspicion is that this shooting does not happen in an environment where political debates are fact based, policy oriented, and lacking in violent rhetoric. But, again, I can’t prove this. Demonizing your opponent as an intolerable Other is more emotionally potent than boring old debates about the relatively modest distinctions between mainstream politicians. But, I also think it’s dangerous. Creating a narrative in which the very soul of a country beset by evil is at stake is probably useful in motivating your supporters; but it also tends to give license to other, potentially darker, political fantasies.

Giving up these narratives is emotionally difficult. When you suggest that people give up spinning those fantastic narratives and abstain from violent metaphors in political rhetoric, I’ve seen a very strong reaction in some quarters, as if you’re asking them to castrate themselves. As if such rhetoric is so vital to self esteem (or, I suppose political viability) that it’s worth the attendant risks. There is vehement denial that there is even the potential for attendant risks. It’s absolutely fair that, for example, Palin and her supporters should react strongly to the suggestion that her rhetorical crosshairs had anything whatsoever to do with the subsequent literal crosshairs. There isn’t any proof. But, there’s something more. You didn’t see the meticulous concern for factual accuracy when allegations about Obama’s “death panels” were the talk of the day.

There is visceral, emotional attachment to violent rhetoric and these political narratives invoking battles between Good and Evil that reminds me of whatever it was that so offended me as a young man by the suggestion that a mature man should be more concerned about living humbly than dying nobly. It’s probably time for us and our political discourse to grow up. However, I doubt there are many votes in that, and, again, it’s emotionally difficult; so pigs will undoubtedly start flying before that happens.

This incident, as well as (more locally), the overturned conviction of grandmother-stabbing Gary Galloway based on insanity concerns (pdf) and, I’m sure, plenty of other incidents; should really be leading to a discussion of how we handle mental illness in our society. But, that won’t happen either. Dealing with mental illness is complicated, expensive, and, again, interferes with a cherished narrative. In this case, the narrative is that we all rise and fall pretty much solely through exercise of our individual will. Recognition of mental illness seriously muddies the waters of our perception of free will and, consequently, issues pertaining to personal control, blame, and even our relationship to good and evil.

I had a legal writing teacher who was warning us about how tough it was to be vigilant when proofreading things we had written. “The brain is a wonderful thing, it just wants you to be happy.” In doing so, the brain creates blind spots to issues that might make you unhappy. In legal writing, that can make you glaze over weaknesses in your arguments. I think the same applies when cherished myths have an uncomfortable relationship to reality.

My recent trip to South Carolina has made me resolve to be more gentle in my treatment of Southerners. In particular, while staying over night in Ashville, NC, I met a nice gentleman and his daughter from Atlanta. (I was a bit amused as my children introduced themselves to these folks as “Lincoln” (his full name) and “Harper Lee.” If I’d had a third child named “Sherman,” it would have been even better.)

Contributing even further to the improvement of my estimation of Southerners was an encounter with a guy named Mike at a bar in South Carolina. I was at a table watching the Colts game against the Raiders. Mike walked in and had a Colts hat on. There were only a couple of TVs showing the Indy game and the seats near those televisions were scarce. I was the only one at my table, so I invited him to have a seat if he wanted. Turns out he was a huge Tennessee Volunteers fan and followed the Colts because of Peyton. Anyway, he shared his onion rings and, unexpectedly, picked up the tab for one of my beers as he left. Very few things are better calculated to improve my disposition than onion rings and beer.

Still, the decency of modern day Southerners notwithstanding, I think it’s important to push back against myths about the Civil War that might tend to soften our views of that dark period in our country’s history. James Loewen has a column in the Washington Post deconstructing five myths about the Civil War: 1) The South did not secede for State’s Rights – if anything, they were against State’s Rights before Lincoln’s election when they were pushing for federal intervention on issues like being allowed to travel in the North with their slaves; 2) Secession was not about tariffs and taxes – those may have been an issue 30 years prior, but just before the Civil War, tariffs and taxes were pretty much set by the South and the Southern states were silent about them when explaining their reasons for secession; 3) while most Southerners didn’t own slaves, that doesn’t mean they weren’t fighting for its continuance – people too poor to own slaves aspired to some day become wealthy enough, and, with slavery, poor whites at least knew they were better than someone; 4) Lincoln did not go to war to end slavery – his personal hope was to have slavery end, but as an official matter, he was clear that if he could preserve the Union by not freeing any slaves, that’s the course he would take; and 5) Slavery would have died out on its own – it’s tough to prove a negative, but the entrenchment of slavery and the wealth it provided to the Southern elite makes it difficult to believe it would have died out on its own accord.

O.k., maybe it wasn’t all Newton’s fault. I’m reading Seeing Further: The Story of Science and the Royal Society. It’s a series of essays by various articles on the subject of the Royal Society in commemoration of it’s 350th anniversary.

The most recent one I finished was Margaret Wertheim who reflects on the impact the scientific revolution had by taking away the place where God lives. (I simplify). In particular, Newton proved that the laws of physics are universal – in other words, things like gravity are going to work no matter how many miles away we travel. We take this for granted, but there are some aspects we probably haven’t quite come to grips with when we think about God. Even today, it’s fairly common to have people point up to the sky when they’re talking about God. (Watch a lot of NFL players after touchdowns, for example.) Back before we really understood what was going on with stars and planets and whatnot, there was a whole cosmology developed around it.

The four terrestrial elements of earth, air, fire, and water were imperfect – subject to deterioration. Stars and celestial objects were made out of the quintessential element which was superior. The closer you got to God, the better stuff was. But Newton and his contemporaries ripped open the sky. God had to move. And we’re still coming to terms with that.

It’s an interesting notion, anyway. For those of you who have a more philosophical, cerebral approach to religion, it probably doesn’t matter too much. But, it’s probably an issue at some level with those for whom religion is a more emotional, character-driven affair with an anthropomorphic God then not having a nearby place for Heaven probably creates some psychological trauma.

Fred Clark, writing about the Tim LeHaye “Left Behind” dreck specifically, but offering thoughts on life generally, has a good post with some discussion about temptation. Now, I’m not a religious person and don’t particularly believe in personifications of good and bad, but that doesn’t mean I don’t believe there are moral choices to be made.

Clark talks about the big flashing warning light that should go off when people find that their spiritual feelings about God’s will matches exactly their own earthly inclinations.

I don’t think either the authors or the members of their Tribulation Force appreciate that temptation doesn’t always announce itself as temptation, doesn’t always look like what it is. But that’s not really the problem here. The temptation to which Rayford is succumbing here looks exactly like temptation and not like anything else. Rayford is lying here, basking in the prestige and luxury of his position, congratulating himself and never questioning why what he “felt in his spirit” as God’s leading should be so remarkably congruent with the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life.
. . .
But we haven’t addressed quite as much the spiritual peril of these job offers or the way that peril is compounded by the self-serving rationalization that working for the Antichrist might be what God wants you to do.

This is a rather important point because it’s the most realistic aspect of these books so far. Nearly all of the action in this story is implausible and impossible, but this is something that can and will happen to every person who reads these books and to every person now reading this blog.

At some point in your life, the Antichrist is going to offer you a job.

Don’t take it.

And especially don’t delude yourself into imagining that taking it might actually be God’s will because, conveniently, God’s agenda for you and the Antichrist’s agenda seem to perfectly overlap. The job offer itself is a trap set for you by others. The rationalizing delusion is a trap set for you by yourself. Just say no.

A small, but significant part of my childhood has passed away. Connie Marker died at the age of 87. Connie was the proprietor of the Richmond Greek restaurant, “Connie’s House of Marker.” And, to me, Connie was the grandfatherly man in the front room of the restaurant sitting in a comfortable chair, watching TV, and smoking a pipe.

My parents were regulars at Connies. They went there most Wednesday nights. They’d leave the phone number to the restaurant out so that we kids could get in touch with them if we needed them. I still remember that number (966-2016). On special occasions (e.g. celebrate good grades), they’d take us too. The Greek salad was one of my favorite foods ever, and they made a mean fried chicken. I recall some pleasant nights slurping down coke after coke as my family sat around a big round table. I remember my Dad’s sketched picture on the wall with many such pictures of the regulars. I remember my folks having their own custom mugs at the restaurant. And, one of my most vivid memories of my Meemaw (who died when I was 10 or 11) is her and my Dad having a friendly but earnest battle over who was going to pick up the check.

Connie himself was a son of Greek immigrants and proud of his heritage; a devoted Shriner; and a professional boxing referee. In any event, his restaurant was just a unique place in Richmond, and I’m glad to have known it and him.

I’ve written about the Mortgage Electronic Registration System (MERS) a couple of times around here. The post I remember most is this one. It’s basically a holding company that mortgage companies would sign up with that allows member companies to trade mortgages among themselves without bothering with paperwork such as recording transfers at the county recorder’s office. MERS would be the lienholder of record as “nominee” for whoever the real owner was.

Matt Taibbi has a post discussing MERS. I particularly liked this observation:

The problem with MERS is a paradox at the heart of the “ownership” question. On the one hand, MERS is the legal assignee of a lot of these mortgage notes. On the other hand, it’s not the “real” owner of the notes, in any way that could ever help you, or the state, or the investors in mortgage-backed securities.
. . .
In short, the mortgage industry considers MERS owner enough to foreclose on you, but not owner enough to be sued, or reasoned with, or even to provide basic customer service.

Thomas Langhorne, reporting for the Evansville Courier Press, has an article about the Tea Party opposition to a referendum as to whether Vanderburgh County and Evansville City governments should be consolidated.

Less government? A will-of-the-people referendum? What’s not for a tea-partier to like? The official story is “too much power in one person’s hands.” My suspicion is that, if the consolidation resulted in a conservative having more power, the local tea party activists wouldn’t be opposed. For all their talk of principles, the only unifying theme I can see in the Tea Party is electing Republicans. A more efficient government is great until the efficiencies come in the form of more power for Democrats.

I’m not unsympathetic to concerns about consolidation of power. But, if you’re going to streamline government, it is almost necessarily going to involve removing power from many hands and putting them into few or one pair of hands. Mussolini, they say, made the trains run on time; but that efficiency came at a price. That’s a down-side to running government like a business.

As an aside, the descriptions of the various Tea Party factions in the article remind me of the various Jewish liberation splinter groups in Monty Python’s “The Life of Brian”: Tea Party Patriots, Hoosier Patriots, Tri-state Tea Party, United Freedom Makers . . . might well be the People’s Front of Judea, the Judean People’s Front, the Judean Popular People’s Front, and the Campaign for a Free Galilee.

My dad was telling me about the latest NCAA football rules violations with Ohio State and some others which I haven’t been following. We talked about the whole student athlete model not being a good fit with some of these big programs. The athlete’s status as students is purely incidental. The NCAA and universities are making big money, and the athletes are required to stay poor.

Ultimately, we decided it would be fun to see Bob Knight given plenary enforcement authority over NCAA rules. I said, I’d watch that! You could create a rules enforcement channel and fund the entire enforcement division just from advertising revenue from that show.

The Fort Wayne Journal Gazette has announced that it will be cutting its Washington Bureau now that it’s long time Washington correspondent, Sylvia Smith, is retiring. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the Journal Gazette won’t continue to do good journalism, but I think it is a symptom of the decline of journalism.

David Cay Johnston has an outstanding blog post entitled “It’s Scary Out There In Reporting Land: Beats are fundamental to journalism, but our foundations are crumbling.” Among other things, he talks about the corrosive effect of cheap news.

“So why is there so much crime on the news every day?” Diane, who was cutting Frank’s hair, asked.

“Because it’s cheap,” I replied. “And with crime news you only have to get the cops’ side of the story. There is no ethical duty to ask the arrested for their side of the story.”

Cheap news is a major reason that every day we are failing in our core mission of providing people with the knowledge they need for our democracy to function.So why is there so much crime on the news every day?” Diane, who was cutting Frank’s hair, asked.

“Because it’s cheap,” I replied. “And with crime news you only have to get the cops’ side of the story. There is no ethical duty to ask the arrested for their side of the story.”

Cheap news is a major reason that every day we are failing in our core mission of providing people with the knowledge they need for our democracy to function.

Another interesting take on the decline of journalism came from Fred Clark who cites the pretense of objectivity among journalists as a fundamental flaw. He says that pretending that one doesn’t differentiate between good news and bad news is incoherent and disingenuous. A commitment to the truth requires commitment to the good.

The claim is disingenuous because, again, newspapers are constantly reporting on the days’ news as being either good or bad. This is not — as the pretense pretends — a matter of “taking sides,” but of acknowledging them. It is an inseparable and unavoidable aspect of the newspapers’ commitment to accuracy.

The pretense that journalism requires — or even allows — neutrality or indifference to good and bad is just that, a pretense. A lie. A vain lie in at least two senses of the word. It is a lie told out of vanity and arrogant self-flattery, and it is a futile lie due to its nonstop refutation by the newspapers themselves.

He continues that, if we accept the premise that we can’t know what is good, then we must also accept the premise that we can’t know what is true, in which case, newspapers have no use. And that is, in fact, the road we’ve been going down where newspapers make no effort to find the truth, resorting instead to a kind of he-said, she-said stenography. The kind of “Some say the moon is made of green cheese, others disagree” reporting.

The miserable flaccidity of this refusal to discern or report the actual facts of the matter is, in my opinion, the only truly terminal disease facing the newspaper industry.
. . .
No matter how true something can be proven to be, once it is disputed journalists will cease to treat it as something that has already been verified as true and verified. They will begin treating it, instead, as something “controversial.” And that which is deemed controversial is no longer reported as true — regardless of the facts and the evidence proving it to be so or the utter lack of facts or evidence suggesting otherwise.

And, finally, just because I’m on the subject, Atrios had a recent post about the resistance to the blogosphere by the traditional press. The press regarded itself as something special, just because. And, pretty much, only employees of big media companies really deserved First Amendment protection as “the press.”

The Journal Gazette was my launching point for this little diatribe simply because the story about the closing of the Washington office was on my feed reader. As newspapers go, the Journal Gazette actually tends to do a better job than most of the Indiana papers I read.