December 22, 1997
Are you breathing? I am, too. We are both emitting that dreaded "greenhouse" gas, carbon dioxide. And let's not forget water vapor, another villain. And what is the obvious answer? That's right, in Red China they have the solution: make them stop breathing.
There are various routes of escape from responsibility; escape into death, escape into disease, and escape into stupidity. The last is the safest and easiest, for even intelligent people are usually closer to the goal than they would like to think.
... Arthur Schnitzler
More and more, I feel that the people of ill will have used time more effectively than the people of good will. We will have to repent in this generation, not merely for the hateful words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.
... Martin Luther King, Jr.
Those of you who know how tempting it can be to toss pearls back into the faces of swine will sympathize with me in my restraint. Among the various kinds of fools presently inhabit the world are two classes that often school together: the bleeding hearts and their psychiatrists. While attending a gathering recently, at which those two classes were amply represented, an animated conversation on crime followed its predictable course, from condemnation of the lawyers, the police, the judges, and the laws to a consideration of the merits of psychological treatment, re-education, and rehabilitation.
Shortly after, the subject of the current trial, the Oklahoma City bombing, Timothy McVeigh, and so on, arose to strident condemnation by the very same people who were a moment before singing the praises of humane treatment for criminals. It was at that moment that an opportunity beckoned to me, with open arms, begging me to enter and be enfolded in its sweet embrace. But to my now public credit, I turned my back upon her and raised the subject of battered husbands. Lost forever was the occasion to sample the exquisitely delicious absurdities that doubtless would have followed, had I not resisted suggesting that the bombing was, in fact, a cry for help.
Amongst those nations whose strategies are directed and supported from the capitalist seat of Hell, the abominable government of Chile must be reckoned a distinct success. I was reading recently about how they have, as they would put it, "privatized" their social security system, taking the funds out of the hands of responsible government officials and placing it, at Satan's personal prompting, in the hands of the workers themselves, to be disposed of, across a broad range of capitalist institutions, as the workers see fit.
Mind you, this is not simply another assault. This strikes a blow at the very heart of the authority of government, and it could mean that the future of the worker rests not with the wisdom of government and policymakers but in the mindless chaos and hellish mischief of the dreaded marketplace. The faithful need to regroup and right this terrible wrong before it spreads to the U.S. And, a fine example the Chilean workers, once so fore-sighted, have been, with 90% of them "opting out" of the system. The takeover by the capitalists of all this money has fueled a huge economic expansion, making Chile the fastest-growing economy in the Americas. Moreover, it has provided more utilities, manufactured goods, trade leverage, and investment than ever before in Chile. Worst of all, unemployment is down sharply.
All these developments are going to make it harder than ever to support the need for socialism, and particularly, for socialist politicians and policies. If the socialists believed in a deity, I would suggest they start to pray.
It was cold that day when the news came back to us. We were warming our feet around the electric logplace in the ramshackle, 1980's building that served as the offices of FRATRICIDE Magazine in its last year or two of operation. It was just me and the two elder statesmen of the magazine, Joe Bob Mencken and Marve "Mixed" Metaphor. All the other employees had gone home because we couldn't heat the place properly.
"When did you know?" I asked, with heavy emphasis on the "know". It was the third consecutive year of declining sales.
"I knew the moment that they admitted the existence of Deep Throat," said Joe Bob, "Oh, we could poke fun, and maybe hit a raw nerve or two. We'd never be able to publish the real thing again. There would never be anything but news from then on."
"I've never known for sure," said Marve, "till now. I look back on it all, of course, and I see where I went wrong. Obvious as the nose on a fish, now. I always said, if you can't take the heat, get out of the frying pan. But don't pay any attention to me, I've always been an idealist."
A noise in the street momentarily drew our attention away from the conversation.
"Well, I swa'n, Marve. That's the second car today. They might have to fix the street at this rate."
"Joe Bob, I saw Mark Russell in the unemployment line this morning."
"I saw Stan Freberg there last week. At his age. Speakin' of which, I understand that Tom Lehrer checked out a while back. You hear anything about that?"
"Yup, he started that old Packard of his and just never opened the garage door. Wouldn't have been legal if he had, of course. Do you know that they fined his widow for the emissions violation? Couldn't pay, of course."
"Way back there, 'round 1974," Marve continued, "I wrote a piece about a powerful Congressman, drinking himself to oblivion, and cavorting with a buxom mistress in the wee hours of the night, on the banks of the P'tomac. Called the woman Foxxy. Had some laughs in it. I posted it to the New Yorker the night before the Wilbur Mills story broke. The New Yorker editor wrote a little note on the rejection slip. Asked if I'd switched to hard news. I started to suspect it then. When did you first notice it, Redmon?"
"Back in '97," I said, the memories burning brightly within me. "It was the Kyoto Summit. They were meeting for a week, and there was a tremendous PR campaign going on. Pointy-headed, Chicken Little types running around having orgasms of sagacity. Administration big guns meeting in back rooms and feeding the media tripe. I had a piece written up, ready to go. Pretty nice bit of satire, if I do say so myself. I thought, what's the worst thing they can do? I looked at some of the proposed numbers, doubled them and started to write the piece. I was gonna say that the U.S. had agreed to a treaty in which the Europeans cut greenhouse gas emissions by 14% and the U.S. cut them by 30%, while the developing nations didn't have to do anything. Including China, which would have tickled everyone's funnybone. Also, the part about the U.S. cutting 30% would have been a sideslapper, too. Take us back to the stone age. There were still people around then who remembered the First Great Depression.
"I had it all finished and ready to go out on the wire, when the news came. What I had predicted as a parody was exactly what had been agreed to. Plus, the President was all smiles, and the Vice President, old Spotted Al, the knothead, was just doing backflips. And you know what, these imbeciles had just signed the death-warrant for western civilization, and the first thing that came out of the greenies' mouths was that it was not enough. Thirty hours of effort on that satire, and I ended up with bupkus."
"Well, it's happened to all of us," said the kindly old man. Joe Bob ponderously arose. "I reckon I'll go on home. Let me know if anything breaks, so I can burn some more paper in my fireplace."
"I didn't hear that," I tossed back at him with a smile. When he did finally retire, Joe Bob would be hard to replace.
Suddenly, the old teletype clattered to life. I had a sinking feeling. Another satire down the drain, I thought as I read the story. John-John Kennedy, at age 65, announced that he is outlawing gasoline, re-seating the entire Supreme Court with nominees of the ACLU, raising the Social Security tax rates to 70%, and will be having a sex-change operation, but sees no reason to withdraw his candidacy for a third term as President.
Scooped by reality again.
In order to tyrannize a large country like the U.S., where people are used to freedom, justice, and reasonably unintrusive institutions, government must make laws, many laws, and thereby create a confusion, a terror that divides and paralyzes the people. One of the most cunning tools for creating new laws has followed on the invention, out of whole cloth, of so-called "hate" crimes. How my murder is worse if my murderer is moved by "hate" of the particular required kinds, than if he simply wants my money or car, is literally beyond me. But the law, instead of merely assessing guilt, is now going to examine the core motivations of the criminal for the particular kinds of hatred that are to be prohibited.
Of course, mere hatred is not enough. The laws only address prohibited hatreds, the hatreds of protected groups. I cannot see how that advances either the cause of justice or the welfare of the protected groups, frankly. What this boils down to is pass laws in reverse: if you commit a crime, and you are the sort of person who can harbor the prohibited thoughts and motivations, then you are a candidate for a higher crime.
But, given just a slightly larger understanding of "hate", it is a poignant irony that of all the fractions of society, government itself is responsible for the vast majority of hate crimes. Consider Social Security, which has impoverished one generation on behalf of another; Affirmative Action, which lays on one individual, possibly blameless, the burden for a possible wrong admittedly committed by a third party; the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities, in their war against the principle religious beliefs of the nation; also, the Justice Department, and the BATF, for their excesses and their war on free speech, to name but a few. Which is worse: a few hooligans scrawling epithets on a church or a synagogue, or what government can do, with all its authority, bureaucracy, enforcement powers, and laws? The assaults that these bureaucracies have launched on traditional beliefs and morals, and particularly on the free practice of religion, are far more destructive. It is clear what, or rather whom, they hate.
There is, out there in the land of reality, a new recording involving an artist that I admire, a Christmas recording, in fact. This publication is so awful, so pathetic, that I hardly have words for it. Indeed, such a work needs no parody; it is its own parody. The artist in question is Placido Domingo. In this recording he is paired with a pop balladeer named Michael Bolton. Now when Domingo is singing alone, the result is approximately what you would expect. Fans of Michael Bolton would probably make the analogous claim on his behalf. But, together they make a racket so dreadful that neither of the parties' adherents could possibly think well of them. What are they singing, I wondered, while listening to some excerpts, and why?
I shall tell you neither the name of the record publisher nor the title of the record, for I would like to feel that in publicizing my experience with their noxious emission, I have saved the less discerning of you a trip through the refund line. But, in all the cacophony, one idea came through with abundant clarity: financial considerations (money, for the less reverent of you) have overcome art in this concoction. They will certainly sell thousands, and possibly millions, of copies of this ghastly opprobrium, and profit, as you all know, particularly at this time of the year, is not something that needs long explanations.
There are persons who have so far outgrown their catechisms as to believe that their only duty is to themselves.
... Samuel Johnson
All contents © Copyright 1995, 1996 by Redmon Barbry ¶ 11:42 PM
