Jesus Got a Gun (and Other Minutiae)

And now for something completely unoriginal: Randomness.

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On a number of "true crime" shows, you'll hear reference to a "nameless killer."  We blame the parents!  Maybe if more parents were willing to name their children, there'd be fewer murders.

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SCENES WE'D LIKE TO SEE:

(An awards ceremony.  Full house.  Audience and hosts in tuxedos and evening gowns.)

HOST: (Stands at podium)  And this year's winner of the "NBA Mr. Sportsmanship of the Year Award."  A man who exemplifies the spirit of fair play and clean competition. . . . (Opens envelope and extracts paper.  Reads.)  From the Cincinnati Queens, Montrose Ellison!!!

(Crowd cheers.  Ellison makes his way to the stage, shaking hands, embracing audience members, high fiving.  He reaches the stage, shakes hands with the presenter.  A model hands him a crystal trophy.  Ellison stands at the podium to address the audience.)

Ellison:  Wow!  Wow!  Well, I would just like say, THAT'S RIGHT, MOTHA-F***AS!  I WON!  IN YOUR FACE!!!  You. . .you. . . Wilson (Camera finds Monk Wilson in audience, looking disappointed).  See this?  (Waving trophy in air.)  It's mine, Asswipe!  You can kiss my sweet, perfectly-toned ass!  'Cause I won, and you didn't!  So just take your skinny ass back to Jacksonville and go cry with the babies at the orphanage you set up, cause you are a LOOOOO-SER!!!  (Ellison improvises a jig, thrusting his pelvis in the general direction of the other candidates.  Sings.)  I am the sports-man-of-the-yea-e-ear!  I am the sports-man-of-the-yea-e-ear!  Everyone else can kiss my ass, 'cause I'm the sports-man-of-the yea-e-ear!"

And so on.

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We got caught up in our commentary about the Supreme Court yesterday, but another article also caught our eye, and we wanted to make sure none of you Sloppists missed out:

"Pastor Urges His Flock to Bring Guns to Church"

We're seriously thinking we may need to start a new feature.  Call it "The Onion Times."  This would be reserved for articles that would be amusing were they in "The Onion," but that simply bring tears to our eyes when they're in the Times (and not tears of laughter, either).

So, anyway, the gist: Ken Pagano, the pastor (!!!) of the New Bethel Church in Louisville, KY, invited his parishioners to, well. . . you can read the headline.  The shindig is happening tonight, Saturday (so you can imagine our anticipation for tomorrow's paper).  Some pertinent quotes from the article:

"'God and guns were part of the foundation of this country. . . . I don't see any contradiction in this."  That's Pastor Ken Pagano, saying there's no contradiction between his duties and encouraging his flock to carry guns.  'Pastoral' (Adjective): Having the simplicity, charm, serenity, or other characteristics generally attributed to rural areas (emphasis added). 

Not every Christian denomination is pacifist.'"  So Pagano's really just emulating his church forebears. . . like Torquemada.

"The bring-your-gun-to-church day. . .will include a $1 raffle of a handgun, firearms safety lessons, and a picnic."  Bring your gun and enter a raffle for a chance to win. . . A GUN!  Let's just hope they don't run out of potato salad at the picnic.  Things could get ugly.

"[There] is little support for the [assault-weapons ban].  Mr. Obama and his party have largely ignored gun-control issues, and the president even signed a measure that will allow firearms in national parks."  "Hey, Boo-Boo!  Look what I have in my pick-a-nick basket: A snub-nosed semi-automatic Mauser!"

"[Several] states have recently passed laws allowing gun owners to carry firearms in more places--bars, restaurants, cars and parks."  Bars.  Think about it.

"Of the 40 states with right-to-carry laws, 20 allow guns in churches."  Hmm. . . . Those 20 slackers don't sound like they have the Christian spirit!

'[A] group of local churches and peace activists [are] staging a counterpicnic--called 'Bring your peaceful heart, leave your gun at home'--at the same time as Mr. Pagano's event."  For their sake, let's hope that Pastor Pagano doesn't have his heart set on conquest!  (Also, we find the word "counterpicnic" adorable.)

"But news media attention--some from overseas--has focused on Mr. Pagano."  We shudder to think how this is playing overseas.  We had hoped that the image of Americans as backward militaristic rednecks would diminish with the end of the Bush regime.  Thanks a lot, Pagano!

"Sheriff's deputies will be at the doors to check that openly carried firearms are unloaded, but they will not check for concealed weapons.  'That's the whole point of concealed,' Mr. Pagano said, adding that he was not worried because such owners require training."  Yeah, there's nothing worse than being shot by someone without training.

"[The] church's insurance company. . . had canceled the church's policy for the day on Saturday and told him that it would cancel the policy for good at the end of the year.  If he cannot find insurance for Saturday, people will not be allowed in openly carrying their guns."  In other words, Pagano doesn't really care if people end up shooting each other in his church, as long as he doesn't have to pay for any damages that might be incurred.  Where's your Messiah, now, Kenny?

We'll leave the final word to John Phillips, pastor of the Central Church of Christ in Little Rock, Arkansas.  In 1986, at a different church, Phillips was shot by a parishioner.  He survived (obviously), but he still has a bullet in his spine from the incident:

"I don't understand how any minister who is familiar with the teachings of the Bible can do this.  Jesus didn't say, 'Go ahead, make my day.'"

Amen.

(Image from "Political Nanny")

Supreme Court Wrap-Up

That politics make strange bedfellows is a cliche.  When jurisprudence makes strange bedfellows, though, it's still newsworthy.

So it was yesterday when Antonin Scalia found himself on the same side of an opinion with Ruth Bader Ginsburg, David Souter, and John Paul Stevens.

(Digression: Well, and Clarence Thomas, but, y'know, Thomas is really just Scalia's sock-puppet.  Has anyone else noticed that we really only have eight Supreme Court justices, one of whom [Scalia] gets two votes, his own and Thomas's?  Probably.  That's too obvious to have been original to the Solipsist.  Not that we won't take credit for it. EOD)

Where were we?  Ah, yes.

The case in question, Melendez-Diaz v. Massachusetts, turned on the question of whether laboratory reports may be used as evidence in criminal trials if the analyst who prepares the report does not testify in court ("Justices Rule Lab Analysts Must Testify on Results").  The majority ruled that it could not.  If we examine the reasoning, it's not surprising that Scalia came down on the ostensibly liberal side of the issue: As a strict constructionist, Scalia feels that the Sixth Amendment, which guarantees a defendant's right "to be confronted with witnesses against him," reasonably encompasses the right to cross-examine the technicians who prepare reports that could lead to a conviction.  As part of his decision, Scalia noted that "the Constitution would require allowing defendants to confront witnesses even if 'all analysts always possessed the scientific acumen of Mme. Curie and the veracity of Mother Teresa.'"

(Digression: He may be something of a fascist, but, credit where credit is due, the man can write. EOD)

The dissenters fretted over the procedural issues this ruling may provoke.  The fear is that, if every defendant demands that lab analysts appear in court, the criminal justice system will grind to a halt.  In the face of financial crises, can states and other jurisdictions reasonably be expected to incur the new costs associated with assuring that lab analysts can appear at every trial in which they will be required to testify?  Maybe not, but that's not really the issue.  As we mentioned in our post of June 19, financial concerns should not be the basis of Supreme Court jurisprudence.

Indeed, we suspect that the logistical issues will largely sort themselves out.  After all, just because defendants have the right to have lab analysts testify, this doesn't mean they will exercise that right.  Defense lawyers are likely to conclude that a lab analyst's testimony is at least as likely to harm their clients as it is to help them.  Still, if we play out the scenario, the ramifications are not all bad.

Let's say a number of defense attorneys take advantage of this new ruling as a gambit for dismissal: Presumably, if the state is unable or unwilling to ensure a lab analyst's appearance at a trial, then a judge would, eventually, have no choice but to dismiss the case.  A defense attorney could reasonably decide that allowing for this possibility is a sound legal strategy, and it is, as far as it goes.  But for this very reason, it could lead to some positive changes.

For example, imagine two trials are scheduled for the same day: one a felony drug possession, the other a murder.  Imagine further that both cases hinge on laboratory evidence and that the same analyst prepared the reports for both cases.  For the sake of argument, let's say that neither case can be delayed.  So what's going to happen?  Which trial do you suppose the analyst is going to attend?  Presumably, the murder trial.  So what becomes of the drug possession case?  It gets dismissed.  In other words, an alleged drug user goes free so that an alleged murderer can be convicted.

This strikes us as a reasonable trade-off.  And if this kind of thing happens enough, maybe that could set us along the road toward legalization--or at least decriminalization--of drugs.  A thoroughly desirable outcome, made all the sweeter by imagining the look on Scalia's face when he realizes it was HIS decision that set the stage!

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In another case decided yesterday, the strange bedfellowing continued with the decision that a school district went overboard when they strip-searched a 13-year-old girl suspected of concealing prescription-strength ibuprofen in her underwear ("Supreme Court Says Child's Rights Violated by Strip Search").  The majority for this case, Safford Unified School District v. Redding, was less remarkable, as the decision was nearly unanimous.  Interestingly, this case broke the Scalia-Thomas bond, as Clarence Thomas was the lone troglodyte who dissented from the decision.  He worried that the Court's decision "provided the nation's students a court-sanctioned hiding place."

Well, yes, we suppose it does.  Of course, this also means that, when high-school students buy drugs from the greasy, acne-scarred, 20-year-old senior in the bathroom, they'll know EXACTLY where those pills were stashed, and they may think twice about popping them into their mouths.

Requiem for a Punchline

Talk about being overtaken by events!  Here we were, all set to compose another installment on "Shameless Joy," about the apparent political death of South Carolina's Republican Governor Mark Sanford.  What is it about Republicans not being able to keep it in their pants?  Yes, yes, Bill  Clinton was hardly a paragon of male sexual restraint, but at least he never claimed to be.  Did you know that Sanford was in the House of Representatives during Clinton's impeachment?  And did you know that he voted for impeachment?  What's more, in citing his reasoning for his vote, he pointed out that Bill Clinton had lied under oath.  He wasn't talking about the perjury charge, though.  According to today's Times, he chastised Clinton at the time for lying "under a different oath, and that's the oath to his wife."  Do you suppose Sanford's put a bandage on his ass where that came back to bite him?

Well, looks like we did get a chance to discuss shameful joy, after all.

But of course, the news that's rocking the world is from the world of rock--or pop, anyway.  Michael Jackson, dead at 50.  Honestly, we were never great fans of the gloved one.  Still, his passing marks a moment, and the marking of moments is what blogs are for.  So, herewith, some random thoughts on the passing of the King of Pop.

. . . . These things come in threes.  Farrah Fawcett, Michael Jackson. . .?  First an iconic pop-culture figure from the 1970s, then an iconic pop-culture figure from the 1980s (mostly).  One can't make any solid predictions, but Ricky Martin better watch his step for the next few days.

. . . . Undoubtedly, Michael Jackson was a tremendously talented individual.  But talk about a fall from grace.  The man must have had an unbelievably troubled childhood, and there's probably a special corner of Hell reserved for overbearing parents of child prodigies.  Still, at some point, sympathy is exhausted.  Child molestation is kind of a deal-breaker.

. . . . We'll probably never know for certain exactly what he did with those children who spent the night at Neverland.  He avoided a trial by paying $22 million to his alleged victim, who then refused to cooperate with police.  Was Jackson paying to protect himself, or just to put an end to things?  Doesn't matter.  He might have been better off going to trial.  Conviction in the court of public opinion is irreversible on appeal. . . .

. . . . The Solipsist is a writing instructor.  In his classes, his students are often assigned to write a paragraph about a celebrity who has had a positive or negative impact on young people.  Invariably, in a set of paragraphs about celebrities who have had a negative impact, 20 - 25% will be about Michael Jackson. . . . .

. . . . Will that change now?  Out of respect for the dead?  Out of a feeling of irrelevance?  Sadly, it will not change because of rehabilitation or comeback.  Over the last couple of years, the percentage of paragraphs dedicated to Britney-Spears has gone down.  She's got an opportunity that Michael Jackson never took advantage of. . . .

. . . . His music will live on.  "Beat It," "Thriller," "Billie Jean," etc.  They're good songs, and quality will last.  Elvis Presley's music is still relevant, too.  But just as there will always be a conflicted image of Elvis--rebel heartthrob vs. Vegas self-parody, so, too, will there be conflicting images of Michael Jackson: adorable sweet-voiced ragamuffin; young superstar with a spectacular set of pipes and inimitable dance moves; accused child-molester and bleached tabloid freakshow.  Which image will prevail?  If the early reports are accurate, things don't look good:  A Fox News correspondent, quoted on the Times' Arts blog:  "People are already showing up in costume, believe it or not."  Oh, we believe it.  We believe there are people out there who have kept their shiny gloves and Jeri curls and red over-zippered motorcycle outfits ready for just this moment.  Looks like Psycho-Michael Motorcycle Gangs will join Fat Elvis Skydiving Clubs in the pop-culture sideshow. . . .

. . . . For what it's worth, Rest in Peace, Michael.

Warning Signs

"So, this is it, we're all going to die."

--Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Did you see where North Korea apparently threatened to "wipe the United States off the map."  That's kind of adorable, don't you think?

Know your enemy, folks.  North Korea is nothing.  The real threat to our future?  Alternative energy!

As part of the effort to wean ourselves off ever-diminishing fossil fuels, the United States and other countries are exploring geothermal energy as a virtually unlimited power source ("Deep in Bedrock, Clean Energy and Quake Fears").  According to an Energy Department report, geothermal power could, in theory, produce 60,000 (that's not a typoe. . . but THAT is) times as much energy as the United States uses every year.  Sounds good.  And unlike those lesser contenders wind and solar, geothermal energy provides the undeniable frisson produced by the knowledge that IT CAN CAUSE MASSIVE EARTHQUAKES!

This is a particular perk for those of us living near the epicenter of the newest proposed project, which straddles Lake and Sonoma Counties in northern California.

Yeah, THAT California.  The one with the San Andreas, Hayward, and other smaller fault lines all over the place.

This is not just empty fearmongering.  We have no objection to empty fearmongering, but this isn't it.  The technique, to be developed by AltaRock, a Google-funded startup, is nearly identical to one that has already caused problems.  In Basel, Switzerland, a fairly large earthquake that struck on December 8, 2006, was blamed on geothermal-energy "mining."

On the other hand, the earthquake apparently struck on the 650th anniversary of another catastrophic earthquake to hit Basel.  So, y'know, maybe it's just something about the date that causes Swiss temblors.  On the other other hand (wait, how many hands is that?), after the main earthquake, there were aftershocks for about a year, about 3,500 (that's not a typo, either) altogether.

A major earthquake and thousands of aftershocks, huh?  On the bright side, the reconstruction work should stimulate California's economy.

If you need the Solipsist, he'll be in the bunker.

Snuff

How does a photograph become iconic?  One word: Death.

Neda Agha-Soltan was a philosophy student in Tehran.  Clandestinely, because it is against the law for Iranian women to do so, she studied singing.  In what would be considered too-obvious symbolism were it to appear in a novel, her first name is Persian for "voice."  Like most of us--and we mean no disrespect when we say this--she was a nobody.   And then her life bled away on a Tehran street and on televisions and on computer screens and newspaper front pages around the world.  Now she is "the voice of Iran."

The video brings to mind other iconic photographs.  In its immediacy, it is evocative of perhaps the most famous war photograph of all time, Robert Capa's 1936 shot of a Republican militiaman apparently being shot in the head during the Spanish Civil War:

One cannot help but imagine what Capa thought.  Right place, right time?  When he set out for the front that day, he could not have expected to get that shot.  Given the angle, Robert Capa himself must have been virtually in the line of fire.  Did he know that he had captured history? Created history?  Did he know his photograph would generate massive support for the Republican cause?  How many men were inspired by this photograph to enlist?  How many met a similar fate?

Consider another iconic moment of death, the shooting of a handcuffed Viet Cong prisoner in Saigon by General Nguyen Ngoc Loan in 1968 (photograph by Eddie Adams):

Does it matter that the prisoner himself was apparently a war criminal?  No.  This picture arguably marked the beginning of the American public's decisive turn away from the Vietnam War--a turn that perhaps became irreversible after the publication of another photograph, a modern Pieta:

Here, we know the victim's name.  Like Neda Agha-Soltan, Jeffrey Miller was a student.  He was one of four Kent State University students shot by National Guardsmen on May 4, 1970.  We even know the name of the anguished young woman--girl, really--kneeling above Miller: Mary Ann Vecchio.  

In confrontations with authority, students disproportionately bear the brunt:

Is this, too, an image of imminent death?  We don't really know.  There is speculation about what happened to "Tank Man"--the only name we have for him--after the protests in Tienanmen Square.  Some say he still lives, very quietly, in China.  Others believe he died during the protests or shortly thereafter.  Somehow, this seems more likely.

At least Tank Man, unlike our other subjects, appears to be an agent of his own destiny.  He clearly made a choice to confront authority; we like to think he was willing to martyr himself for his cause.

Was Jeffrey Miller willing to die for his cause?  Maybe, but we can assume he didn't expect to.  Neda Agha-Soltan wasn't even protesting when she was shot.  She had gotten out of her car for a breath of fresh air when a bullet struck her.  Maybe she and Miller will meet somewhere and compare notes.

One other thing that we can't help noticing: In this newest exhibit in the Gallery of Death, we literally watch Neda die.  This is different.  With those other icons, we saw a moment of death; with Neda, we get a narrative.  We cannot help but wonder if she realized what was happening--not just that she was dying, but that her death was unimaginably public?  Did she notice the videographer?  As an apparently apolitical woman, would she find comfort in the fact that her death is inflicting massive, possibly irreparable damage on the Iranian clerical regime? 

For her sake--and for ours--we hope so.  Otherwise, this isn't history.  It's a snuff film.

(Neda Agha-Soltan image from NYTimes.com; Robert Capa--Falling Soldier image from photo.net; Kent State shooting image from Forgotten Ohio: Kent State University; Vietcong prisoner image from Arkitektrue.com; Tienanmen Square image from Wikipedia)

Is That a Detachable Nose in Your Pocket, Or Are You Just Glad to See Us?

Get-rich-quick scheme of the day: Adult (i.e., dirty) Mr. Potato Heads.  Come on!  That's an AWESOME idea!  So awesome, of course, that probably someone's thought of it already.  Hold on, we're going to check.

Talk quietly amongst yourselves.

It looks promising.  On Google images, we found Darth Vader Potato Heads (Darth Tater), R2-D2 Potato Heads, Cowboy Potato Heads, Ninja Potato Heads, Ghost Potato Heads, KISS Potato Heads, Houston Astros Potato Heads, Arizona Diamondbacks Potato Heads, Transformer Potato Heads (seems a bit redundant, that), Pirate Potato Heads, Santa Potato Heads, Princess Leia Potato Heads (presumably MRS. Potato Head, unless there's something we don't know about Mr. P.), Clown Pumpkin Potato Heads ("Clown Pumpkin Potato Heads"???), Indiana Jones Potato Heads (Taters of the Lost Ark--maybe the whip is a little kinky), Detroit Red Wings Potato Heads, Spiderman Potato Heads, Pretty Much Any Baseball, Hockey, Basketball or Football Team Potato Heads, Fisherman Potato Heads, Bunny Rabbit Potato Heads, etc., etc., etc.

But nary a dirty spud in the bunch.

Manufacturing the things should be easy enough.  Presumably, it would only involve the addition of another slot.  Or two.  Three at most.  We could sell them on eBay and Facebook and Myspace--anywhere that fine humor-themed erotica can be found!  Think about the gift possibilities.  What do you get for the Trekkie who has everything?  How about a freakishly well-endowed Spock Potato Head?

The Solipsist hereby trademarks the idea of Adult-Themed Mr. and Mrs. Potato Heads.  Any Sloppists who want to take the idea and run with it are welcome; the home-office will settle for 40% of the proceeds.

(Image from www.socko.com)

Sunday Paper Recap (A Brief Post)

Not much to say today.  It's Father's Day, so we've been a bit lazy.  We expect to be back to our rambling blitherings tomorrow.

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A major rallying cry of those who oppose a federal health insurance plan--much less a single-payer system--is that it would lead to "rationing" of healthcare.  Are these people under the impression that we don't have rationed care now?  Under a single-payer system, it's likely that the amount of care any one person gets would be rationed; under our current system, however, rationing is more front-loaded: Some get medical assistance, others don't.  Which is better?  Guess one's answer might depend on where one falls in the rationing scheme.

Still, we're heartened to know that a most Americans seem willing, at least, to pay a little more in taxes in order to help those less fortunate folks to receive some kind of healthcare ("In Poll, Wide Support for Government-Run Health").  It doesn't make us all warm and fuzzy at the thought of all us caring Americans: We chalk it up to self-interest.  The more people who can see a doctor, the less likely we all are to suffer the ravages of drug-resistant TB or ebola.  More than that, though, it goes back to our feeling of optimism that common sense is on the rise.  Another small victory for post-ideology.