For the last day and a half I have been very ill. Actually, I still am, but I’m able to move around. I’m not sure what it is. I though it might be an ulcer, but I think it is now above my stomach. I think it may have something to do with a terrible cough I have. It may be a lung infection or something. Be that as it may be, all the time I was out of commission I was fretting over the fact that I wasn’t writing anything on this blog.

Now, I could say this was just because I care so much about all of you. But I don’t think that’s the primary issue. A couple of days ago, I wrote that religion and porn were 99% narcissistic. In general, blogging is 100% narcissistic. Now you know.

I came to blogging very late. When blogs first appeared, I already had a fairly popular website where I wrote much the same kind of stuff I do here. It seemed to me that blogs were just a way for the computer limited to have their own websites. I still believe that, but I have a much more positive take on it. Why should someone understand typesetting (effectively) in order to publish their content? And even I have to admit that this is a hell of a lot easier a way to work than creating pages.

Of course, this highlights just how many good, knowledgeable writers are out there. The main thing that distinguishes people is whether they are willing to commit to it. There are a lot of people who blog for about nine months and then stop. Often they are rather good. I’m sure the fact that no one cares is a big part of the reason they stop. But there is another problem. I remember listening to Michael Krasny interviewing some columnist. They noted that most people could write a couple of columns, but doing it every week for a long period of time is what is hard.

I haven’t had this problem. But looking back at my early days, it is surprising how little I wrote. In general, it was just a couple of things per month. Overall it is just a matter of expectations. Now I think it is strange if I don’t write at least a few articles per day. But it is a lot easier now that I have a readership. The whole process seems a tad less narcissistic. Perhaps only 99%.

I came down to visit my sister and help her with her taxes. As a result, she tortured me by making me watch American Idol. There was an interesting woman auditioning for the show last night. She wasn’t much of a singer. In fact, I couldn’t catch the melody of the song that she was singing. In her defense, these are very tough a cappella auditions. But she clearly hadn’t ever done anything more than sing along with the radio. What was interesting about her was that she had a great back story: God told her to audition. Along with all the failed Republican presidential candidates who God told to run, I am coming to the opinion that God is an asshole. But the judges were pretty nice.

As a result of watching this bit of American Idol, I heard the story of Stephanie Sanson. She is the screamer (they have another woman singer) for the post-hardcore band You Only Live Once. Basically, it was just a stunt to get some publicity for the band. She stood before the judges and screamed out a bit of Adele’s Set Fire To The Rain. Here is the performance, but pay particular attention to the reactions of the judges:

I’ve made no secret of my dislike of American Idol, although I haven’t written specifically about it. But this little clip encapsulates what I hate about the show. I’m not a fan of Sanson’s style of singing. But I realize that it is a valid way to use a voice. It isn’t without art. And I doubt in that brief demonstration that the judges could tell how good she was. It was very telling at the end when Mariah Carey said, “I just want you to know that she plays piano and loves ballet.” It was soaked in sarcasm. But why? She was claiming that Sanson’s style of musical performance makes it impossible that she has taste in art more generally?

What this all shows is that the creators of American Idol have an extremely limited idea of musical art. It would never produce a John Lydon or Bob Dylan or even Elvis Presley. It is all about technique and never pushing the stylistic envelope. And that’s fine. Unfortunately, the show has a pernicious effect on the music that plays on major radio stations. Many people I know have lost their ability to appreciate anything but the most vanilla songs, production, and performances. And that’s especially sad at a time when there is more good music than at any time in history.

So all the American Idol audience can laugh at the screaming girl. They can all pretend that they have the line to perfect music. But they only harm themselves.

Afterword

The band put out a video about what they were doing with the American Idol audition. Unfortunately, they don’t have much to say except that it was an attempt to get some publicity. It is, however, interesting that they all take what they do very seriously. It is a good contrast to the judges who ignorantly thought it was all a joke. Also on the video is a small sample of You Only Live Once: at the beginning and at the very end. The second one is a song they did in the studio and I rather like it. It is called Chasing Dreams. Check it out:

It has to be hard to be someone like Chuck Hagel. I wouldn’t be able to do what he’s doing. It is clear that he is extremely well qualified for the job of Secretary of Defense. But all of the Republican senatorial carping at him was too much. The big moment in the hearing was when John McCain wanted a “yes or no” answer to whether Hagel was wrong to predict that the surge in Iraq would be the biggest foreign policy mistake since the Vietnam War. Hagel wouldn’t answer because he said it was more complicated than that.

Fair enough, but my answer would have been different. “What does my prediction about one part of the Iraq War have to do with anything? I may have been wrong about the surge, but I wasn’t nearly so wrong as when I originally supported the war. The problem with you is that you refuse to admit that the Iraq War was wrong, that tens of thousands of people died for no good reason. So I suppose the surge not being a total fiasco is the one thing you are hanging onto; you were wrong about everything else. You know, I was the co-chair of your 2000 campaign and you treat me like this? You have no honor, senator. None at all.” Of course, what I would have said would have been more “colorful,” if you know what I mean.

Senator Inhofe asked Hagel why the “Iranian foreign ministry so strongly supports your nomination.” I would not have have taken kindly to that question. “I realize that there is substantial cognitive degeneration past the age of 70, but you really should try to get your facts straight. The Iranian foreign ministry has done no such thing. But I suspect that they are generally happy at the idea that we aren’t going to have more people in this administration that are just itching for a war with Iran. Unlike you, I’ve actually fought in a war. I know the stakes and I will serve this country with honor as I always have. You perhaps should retire where your cognitive dysfunction won’t embarrass you or the country.”

Most of the time at the hearing was spent complaining that Hagel wasn’t pro-Israel enough. “Senators, your constant screams of support for Israel do not make the country safer. In fact, I often wonder how much you all support Israel as opposed to just wanting to appear as though you do. I have been a steadfast supporter of Israel, but that doesn’t mean that I think the country always does the right thing. No Israeli thinks Israel always does the right thing. I’m not itching for a War—for the United States or for Israel. I think you all are and thus I think you all are no friends of Israel.”

But it didn’t go like that. Hagel mostly just took it politely. He also went back on factually true statements. It’s sad. But I hope more than ever that he gets confirmed. The Republicans embarrassed themselves. Again.

See Also

As you all know, I like Bill Maher. I think he is funny and he is right about a lot of politics. But I get very angry at him when he is egregiously wrong. This happened most recently during the presidential campaign. Goldie Taylor was on his show. She claimed that Obama would win 330 electoral votes. Maher claimed that this was an example of the “liberal media bubble.” But as I pointed out at the time, it was no such thing. When Taylor made the claim, there was a 21% change of Obama getting that many votes. And in the end, he got 335 votes.

Last week on his show, he discussed another conservative canard that for whatever reason he just accepts at face value: more people are on disability and we should be outraged. In his little brain, this is all about the Paul Ryan hammock: Americans are just getting more lazy. It goes right along with Maher’s libertarian inclinations. The problem is, it just isn’t true.

The Congressional Budget Office looked at this question last July. And they found there are three primary reasons why there are more people on disability. First, the workforce is older; older workers are more prone to career ending disabilities. Second, because most women work now, there is a larger percentage of the population that works; more workers causes more people on disability. Third, the Reagan administration changed the qualifications for disability to be more fair; more workers qualified for disability causes more people to be on disability.

This is not hard stuff to understand. What’s more, this isn’t news. A Google search of “rise disability rates cause” brought up that article above. So Maher is either just following his prejudices or he’s listening to conservatives with an ax to grind. Regardless, I really expect better of him.

I know that not long ago, I checked Wikipedia to find out if Jim Nabors was openly gay. And as I recall, there was really nothing about it. Of course, I assumed he was. I don’t know why. There are those stories about Rock Hudson. Everyone assumed. And maybe it is just that no one cared, Nabors being so obviously such a good boy.

Regardless, open secret or just no one caring, it seemed to me that Nabors was kind of living as a closeted gay man. And that always makes me sad. Well yesterday, he told Hawaii News Now that he got married to his longtime boyfriend Stan Cadwallader.[1] And I am almost giddy with joy!

But let me nip one nasty rumor that is going around. Nabors is quite a lot older than Cadwallader. When they first got together Cadwallder was 26 and Nabors was 44. This is not an unreasonable age difference, even at that young age. By the half plus seven rule, we have: 44/2+7 = 29. And that means that their relationship is officially not creepy. [Oops! I got that wrong! It was a little creepy. -FM]

So in honor of their marriage, I offer you Jim Nabors performing Oh My Papa!

Afterword

Look at the direction of that clip. That is a lot better than other TV of that time.

[1] Hawaii has some kind of civil union, but not same-sex marriage. As a result, Nabors and Cadwallader were married in Washington state.

I am not a big fan of video porn. But like any American male of my age, I know Ron Jeremy. According to USA Today, Mr. Jeremy is in the hospital, following heart surgery for an aneurysm. The article claims that Jeremy is a “porn star.” And indeed, he has “starred” in over 2000 porn films. But you have to ask: is Ron Jeremy really a star?

Was William Kempe a star? Because Kempe was to Elizabethan theater, what Jeremy is to porn: comic relief inside the larger structure of the drama. But while Kempe undoubtedly was a major draw, I’m not sure that Jeremy is. Did anyone rent Debbie Does Dallas Part II because of him? I doubt that. But I don’t doubt his value to the films. He provides much needed (and easily created) padding for films that, left to themselves are more like training films for gynecologists than entertainments.

I was very struck by the following tweet that his manager sent out.

The PrayForRon hashtag is probably why so many people love this man. And it is certainly why I decided to write this article. Because despite what Althea says in The People vs. Larry Flynt, we do want our religion and porn mixed. In fact, I don’t see much difference between them; they’re both 99% narcissism.

God may not exist, but Ron Jeremy probably does. #PrayForRon!

There is a blogging problem that I’ve only really noticed the last few months. There is a constant feeling that you’ve written about “this” (whatever it is) before. Because you have. Because the same old bullshit comes up time and time again. Case in point: the size of the economy shrunk last quarter. Now, this hasn’t happened since I started writing about politics. But I seem to write every day about the story behind this fact.

Our GDP decreased by 0.1% this last quarter. But if it weren’t for the shrinking of government purchases, our GDP would have increased by 1.2%. That’s right: the government is hurting our economy by not spending enough. And this has always been true for the last couple of years. It isn’t just conservatives who are blithely unaware that the federal budget deficit has come down each of the last three years.[1] That in itself would not be so bad, given that it hasn’t come down that fast. The problem is that at the same time, state and local budgets have plummeted.

Ezra Klein presents the following graph which shows the share of public and private spending as it relates to GDP. And what it shows is that despite the claims of conservatives—Government spending is out of control!—government is spending less and less, quarter after quarter.

So there we have it again: the government needs to spend more, not less. Government austerity is hurting our economy. It isn’t a lack of “confidence” or a balanced budget. There is not enough demand and it ripples all through the economy. The government needs to spend more, not less.

[1] In looking for a reference, I was again reminded of just how deceptive conservatives are when they present the budget deficit. They invariably present the fiscal year 2009 budget as Obama’s, even though it was Bush’s budget. The more intellectually honest writers note this but then pass it off as though Obama could just step into office and change Bush’s budget. Of course, I’m not blaming Bush for the budget deficit. It came about because of the financial crisis and the bursting of the housing bubble. It isn’t particularly Bush’s “fault,” but it most definitely isn’t Obama’s.

There are some things that America just can’t get enough of. There is always money for the military. There is always money for prisons. There is always money for border security. Yet there is almost never any indication that this money is well spent. Quite the opposite, actually. Let’s talk border security, shall we?

From 2005 to 2010, the amount we spend on border security almost doubled. We now spend $18 billion per year on border security. This is about what we spend on Pell Grants, but while they are decreasing, border security is skyrocketing.

I suppose we can take some solace from the fact that the number of deportations has also skyrocketed—although they have not gone up by quite as much. We have reached the point where there is no net illegal immigration. But the main reason that we’ve accomplished this has nothing to do with our more rigorous enforcement. Instead, it is due to the economic downturn. There just aren’t as many economic opportunities in the United States and so people are not coming as much as they used to.

None of this matter, of course. The federal government always wants more money for border security. Because in the United States, it doesn’t matter that you accomplish anything, only that you look like it.

I watched Babe: Pig in the City again last night. It is a wonderful film. Even better than the first one that is also wonderful in its own way.

My major problem with the original film is the ridiculous plot device of a secret code that makes all sheep talk to you, “Baa-ram-ewe . Baa-ram-ewe. To your breed, your fleece, your clan be true.” Oh my! I understand that it’s a children’s story, but still. It doesn’t ruin the film by any means, but it does make it something less than it could have been. Also the third act was weak with Rex running all the way back to the farm.

Pig in the City only uses “Baa-ram-ewe” once, and to good comedic effect: it doesn’t work on pit bulls (actually bull terriers). But the film still suffers from a weak third act. The banquet scene is far too busy; it is hard to know what is going on; and it all goes on for too long. I would have enjoyed more time with the zany cast of animal characters. More time could certainly have been spent with the break-out from the pound.

There are other things that people no doubt complain about. The plot is episodic, but I think it would have been less so if they had spent less time getting to the hotel and less time resolving the plot. Regardless, I think the writing does a good job of weaving a single plot line throughout, although it does get a bit muddled toward the end. Another potential complaint is that the story of the humans gets dumped for the whole of the second act. I tend to think this could have been dealt with by a tiny bit of cross cutting, and I don’t doubt that this was in the script. But in the end, how can humans compare with Ferdinand and Flealick?

Above all, the reason I prefer Pig in the City to Babe is that it has a better cast of characters. It also has standout scenes that the first film lacks. The most obvious is Babe’s saving of the Bull Terrier and the resulting situation where the mean dog enforces Babe’s egalitarian rules. But by far my favorite moment is when Thelonius insists upon dressing before escaping. In that moment, he is all of us. There is nothing eternal about our cultural habits, but we follow them because it is our way; we get meaning from them. This is paid off admirably by two short scenes. The first is when Thelonius is trailing behind as the animals are escaping through the hospital. A child recognizes him and says, “Hello Thelonius!” It is sweet: there are advantages to keeping up appearances. The second is at the end when we see Thelonius hand Esme Hoggett a laundry pin as the narrator says, “As for the Orangutan, he insisted on staying at the farmhouse… with Herself.”

And all was right in the universe, or at least our little part of it. Thank you, pig.

Afterword

I also like how much higher the stakes are in the second film. It does make it a lot darker. A good example of this is when the chihuahua says, “My human tied me in a bag and throwed me in the water.” Wow! In a world where your human throwed you in the water, we need all the pigs we can get. But Babe-like pigs; not those horrible pigs who are always tormenting Shaun the Sheep.

Jonathan Chait reported something today that was so unbelievable that I had to look into it. Conservatives were at the Supreme Court the week before last trying to both get California’s Prop 8 (gay marriage) overturned and force the White House to enforce the Defense of Marriage Act. As Chait rightly points out, its fine for a conservative to just be against gay marriage because he is, “But if you’re a lawyer defending a gay-marriage ban in court, you need an actual legal reason for your position.” And boy oh boy did the conservatives come up with an actual legal reason!

The conservatives are arguing that same-sex couples should not be allowed to marry because they don’t have accidental pregnancies. Chait says, “Gay couples don’t get drunk and wake up pregnant.” Therefore: no marriage for you!

I had a hard time believing this. Was it April first? No. Was there some giveaway in the text—a nod and a wink? No. So I clicked over to the LA Times, Gay Marriage Opponents Take Unusual Tack With Supreme Court. Chait was telling the truth. The article reports that the lawyers are arguing, “Unintended children produced by opposite-sex relationships and raised out-of-wedlock would pose a burden on society.”

There are ways to make the argument sound less ridiculous. But it always comes down to this: we need marriage to make couples behave properly. There will always be responsible couples, of course. We don’t need marriage for them. In fact, if it weren’t for the irresponsible couples, we wouldn’t even have marriage. Thus, there is no point in expanding the definition of marriage because it isn’t necessary.

There are some obvious problems here. What if a absolutist anti-choice lesbian get pregnant via rape? That would be unintended. Her non-married mate could just leave, not wanting the responsibility. I realize that this is not going to happen all that much, but doesn’t the society have an interest in seeing that the child is raised by two parents?

Another issue, of course, is equal protection. (I realize that conservatives only think that equal protection applies to George W. Bush, but still.) Why should responsible heterosexual couples get (for example) tax benefits when responsible homosexual couples do not?

It is all quite silly. But note: the big lawyer behind this is none other than Paul “If the state can force you to buy healthcare why can’t it force you to buy broccoli” Clement. That was no more silly and he managed to get four of the justices to agree. Who knows how he’ll do with this case.