Born in the USA

Birther (n.) - One who believes that Barack Obama was not born in Hawaii, which would presumably negate the constitutional validity of his election; see also, 'sore loser'; see also 'wingnut.'

One of our Facebook friends posted something that she had found on the page of one of her Facebook friends. This friend of the friend had downloaded something from the minutes of a Kenyan parliament meeting, wherein the Minister of Lands had supposedly made the following comment:

"If America was living in a situation where they feared ethnicity and did not see itself as a multiparty state or nation, HOW COULD A YOUNG MAN BORN HERE IN KENYA, WHO IS NOT EVEN A NATIVE AMERICAN, BECOME THE PRESIDENT OF AMERICA?"

(CAPITALS added)

We say "supposedly" because apparently the minutes were subsequently "scrubbed" to remove the offending statement,one which, if true, would confirm the fears of the birthers who doubt that President Obama was born in the United States.

Following this? A Kenyan Minister made a somewhat inflamatory statement, but the existence of this statement cannnot be verified because the statement no longer officially exists. Convenient. We would like to mention that this same Minister also said Sarah Palin is a psychotic xenophobe whose narcissism makes Muhammad Ali look like a shrinking violet. Seriously! That got scrubbed, too.

Look, we get it. These guys don't like Obama. Fine. They want to trash his policies? Fine.

(DIGRESSION: Although we would like to know exactly how anybody has so far been harmed by the President's policies. All we ever hear about is how things are going to be disastrous, how Obama is going to ruin America. . . Where were all these people when W was squandering a $400 billion surplus and getting the country into an immoral and probably illegal war? So much for the virtue of the native-born American. EOD)

So scream about his politics and policies all you want, but deal with this fact: Obama was born in Hawaii. He has shown his birth certificate. He was duly elected by a fairly sizable majority of the polutlation--a helluva lot more "duly" than George W (see Florida 2000, Jews for Buchanan, Bush v. Gore, etc.).

As for that Minister's statement, let's assume he DID say it. So what? Why should we take his remarks as gospel? Maybe he is mistaken. Maybe he was just confused by the remarks of the lunatic fringe who keep insisting that Obama is NOT an American. This is what's called a tautology, folks: Birthers scream that Obama was born in Kenya, and as proof of this fact, they cite someone who, for all we know, was just listening to what they said.

(Digression: If McCain had been elected President, would these same people be complaining about the fact that he was born in Panama? He was you know.

(See what we just did there? We introduced a piece of specious misinformation. Yes, before you jump down our throats, we know McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone, which was under US Government jurisdiction. Still, it makes you wonder, doesn't it?Can't we find ANYONE born in this country to run it? EOD)

Bottom line: Obama is American. Kenyans would love to claim him--who wouldn't want to claim a brilliant, sophisticated, charming fellow like him as a compatriot. But he's American. He's the President. Accept it.

Well Begun and All Done: A Frolic of His Own

The book:

A Frolic of His Own by William Gaddis.

Opening line:
Justice? --You get justice in the next world, in this world you have the law.

Ending line:
Lily come here quickly I can't, Lily help me!

The first thing we should tell you about A Frolic of His Own is that it is marked by a highly distinctive style: Call it, Gaddisian English. In Gaddisian, language is used not so much to show or to tell but rather to immerse. Gaddis ignores conventional punctuation, counting instead on a meticulous ordering of words and on the unflagging attention of his readers: If you read carefully, you fall into the flow of Gaddisian, and you can keep track of what is happening; if you are a lazy reader, you will be lost.

The first line is a good example of Gaddis's mechanics. The first word, "Justice," should be understood as the thought of one of the characters, the same character who then speaks the next line (You get justice in the next world. . . .). Gaddis eschews quotation marks in favor of dashes. He never directly identifies his speakers: Readers are left to sort that out through careful attention to dialogue--dialogue which comprises the bulk of the novel.

In this case, the speaker is Harry Lutz, the brother-in-law of the main character, Oscar Crease. Harry is a lawyer and seemingly the most level-headed character in the book. This opening line establishes the central theme of the novel, which is primarily a satire on the American legal system. Oscar Crease is constantly seeking "justice" through a variety of lawsuits (in one of which he ends up suing himself) but is constantly thwarted by the neverending complications of the legal industry.

About the closing line, we have less to say; indeed, we admit to being slightly shaky about what, exactly, is happening at the very end of the novel. We can tell you that the various lawsuits are resolved with about the level of satisfaction for the main characters that one would expect in a work of satire.

Ultimatelty, Frolic is notable as an exercise in style. The writing is hypnotic, which is fortunate, because it's also challenging. This is not a light read, but if you're looking for a somewhat unique literary experience, you may want to take on the challenge.

Setting the Record Straight

Sometimes, we hear a news item and immediately think, "Well, there's today's 'Solipsist.'" We breathe a sigh of relief: Now we don't have to spend the rest of the day paying attention to stuff, hoping to find a morsel to throw to the groveling masses of Solipsist Nation. Bunch of needy entertainment junkies, you people are. . . . Why don't you all get a life?!?

Sorry. Sorry. Don't know what came over us. It's been a long day.

Anyhoo, this morning we heard one such news item: Geico is in the market for a new Gecko. According to our (we thought) reliable source, the insurance company had severed ties with the actor who provides the voice for its popular spokeslizard after said actor left a provocative message on the voicemail of FreedomWorks, a Tea-Party organization. In the message, the actor, Lance Baxter (aka, D C Douglas), wonders how many Tea Partyers are "mentally retarded" (OK, kind of insulting to people with mental retardation) and what the organization plans to do when one of its members "actually kills someone" (a pretty good question, actually).

Shock and disillusionment! The Geico Gecko is not an actual lizard! He's just some stupid actor (albeit one with his heart in the right place, politically).

Two questions: One, how could Geico so cravenly fire someone for exercising his freedom of speech as a private citizen? And, two, how could we go about becoming the new Gecko?

(Digression: True, we can't emulate the Gecko's famously endearing British accent; true, the only accent we've ever mastered is "Appalachian moonshiner"; but maybe Geico would be interested in going that direction. EOD)

Well, dreams die hard, but they die quickly. Turns out Lance Baxter is not the voice of the Gecko--he's the baritone who comes on at the end of the commercials; you know, "Geico. Fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent on car insurance." Who wants THAT boring gig? That's so simple a caveman could do it!

Nobody's Good-Looking in Wal-Mart

Just an observation.

Understand: We're NOT saying that nobody attractive ever goes into Wal-Mart; WOS and YNSHC alone refute that theory. Rather, there's something about store itself that acts like some kind of beauty-sucker. Probably the pervasive atmosphere of worker exploitation. Or just really bad lighting.

We know, we know: "Solipsist, what are you even doing in Wal-Mart? The place is pure evil."

It is. . . but check out these prices! We're only human; we're not immune to the seduction of the rollback special. A six-pack of tube socks for $2.98--WITH A BONUS PAIR OF SOCKS! Are you kidding?!?!

Wal-Mart does pose something of an ethical dilemma to the socially conscious shopper. We don't approve of Wal-Mart's effect on locally-owned businesses, and we are even less sympathetic to their labor practices. But when times are tight, it's hard to resist a bargain. And while we lament the fact that the store treats its employees--particularly its female employees--in less than desirable ways, we realize that it is these very workers who depend on the low prices that Wal-Mart provides.

We take comfort in the thought--the hope, really--that Wal-Mart may become something of a victim of its own success. After all, if so many of their customers are also their employees, they'll almost have to start paying better--if only to maintain their customer base. In the meantime, we'll do our best to resist the lure of . . . of. . . . . .

Chicken pot pies: 3 for $3,00?!? We've got to run.

Play to Lose

We have little sympathy for Wall Street Masters of the Universe. At the same time, we're not one of these knee-jerk "soak the rich" types: Who wants a bunch of soggy tycoons dripping about? Our point is, we try to be fair and balanced--in the literal, not the Fox News sense--in our thought process. All of which is by way of saying that, much as we'd love to see malefactors of great wealth suffer, we're not sure the government has much of a case against Goldman Sachs ("A Difficult Path in Goldman Case").

The way we understand the situation is as follows: A few years back, some financial wizard-type felt that the whole subprime mortgage market was going to implode--as, of course, it eventually did. Said financial wiz went to Goldman and got them to put together a package of dicey mortgages that he could then bet against. If he was right, and the value of the mortgages went south, he would make money (we have a tenuous grasp of how the whole "shorting" thing works, but that doesn't really matter here). On the other hand, if this guy was wrong, and the mortgages didn't collapse, he stood to lose money. At the same time, Goldman also sold shares in this portfolio to other investors, investors who were thinking that the portfolio would rise in value. The government's fraud case--at least as we understand it so far--rests on the idea that Goldman should have informed the outside investors that the portfolio had been put together based on the recommendations of someone who thought that these mortgages would lose value.

Frankly, we don't get it. We realize that, especially in hindsight, gazing out upon the financial wreckage and ruined lives of decimated homeowners, any discussion of someone planning to profit on other people's misery provokes a certain disgust. But let's pretend we're not talking about mortgages, about people's homes. What if some investor had a hunch that, say, the bottom was going to fall out of the athletic shoe market? Maybe in Jay-Z's latest video all the cool kids are decked out in Crocs and penny loafers. This investor then asks Goldman to put together a portfolio consisting of shares in Nike and Adidas and Reebok for the express purpose of betting against it. Well, if another investor looks at this portfolio and thinks it will make money, where is the fraud? Why should they be told that another investor asked for the creation of this portfolio on the assumption that it would lose money? For that matter, even if they were told this, why would we assume they wouldn't throw money into the portfolio anyway? One of the bedrock principles of investing is that some people are bulls and some are bears: Some people think stocks will rise, others think those same stocks will fall. We could imagine a situation where investors might be more inclined to buy a portfolio of stocks that someone else had "designed" to fail, on the simple assumption that the creator might have gotten it wrong.

Caveat emptor is a classic warning for a reason. If these financial titans empted without sufficient caveating, is that the fault of the seller or the buyer? More importantly, is it a crime?

Everything We Ever Needed to Know We Did Not Learn in Education Classes

Back in the day, when YNSHC was preparing to be a teacher, we had two choices: We could either complete a master's degree in education or in another subject of our choosing (in our case, English). Since New York City is always in need of teachers, the authorities make things as easy as possible on those pursuing a teaching career. While one does need to complete a master's degree in order to be fully certified, all a prospective teacher needs to do is complete a master's in education--which simply requires a series of education classes and no master's thesis. You can complete the whole thing in about a year with a minimum of stress and strain. The choice is really a no-brainer.

We did the master's in English.

Part of our reasoning was that we had already taken a plethora of undergraduate education classes, so we had no need to take additional ones. Of course, this would have made the master's even easier, as we had already experienced, in one form or another, most of the coursework to which we would have been exposed. But frankly the thought of spending even one supernumerary (look it up) minute in an education class was anathema--no matter how easy our subsequent glide path into a teaching career would have been.

Now, the New York State Board of Regents may take a step that will ensure that prospective teachers can bypass the mind-numbing morass that is the teacher-training school. Instead of requiring specialized certification from programs like Teachers' College, the Regents would allow teachers to meet certification through alternative programs like Teach for America. The advantage would be that teachers would focus on practical techniques, like classroom management and lesson planning, rather than spending time on philosophical debates about the role of education in a free society and the history of pedagogical theory.

Look, we know a lot of education teachers, and we respect the scholarship that goes into becoming an expert in that field. But we also know that, had we entered a high school classroom armed only with what we had learned in our education classes. . . . Well, you wouldn't be reading this blog now, because we would have been eaten alive by the students. It was only through our experiences working in classrooms (college classrooms, luckily), that we developed an understanding of how to teach, how to explain, how to interact. More valuable than any of our classes on pedagogical theory would have been the simple act of sitting in classrooms and watching teachers teach.

Anything that privileges hands-on, experiential learning in a working (or even a non-working) classroom over sterile indoctrination through hidebound theorizing is to be welcomed. Those who can do. So let those who want to teach do it--it's a great way to find out if they can.

Odds to No Particular End

Not much going on today. Europe remains enshrouded in volcanic ash; one is reminded of Cormac McCarthy's The Road, wherein a father and son wander a grey post-apocalyptic landscape. The actual cause of the devastation remains unstated in the novel; we presume McCarthy was suggesting nuclear annihilation. But maybe it was a volcano. Danes should stock up now against the possibility of marauding cannibalistic survivalists.

Speaking of the volcano, you know what the name of it is: Eyjafjallajokull. Maybe it erupted because it was pissed off about people continuously mispronouncing it?

We're still waiting to see if President Obama will come to his senses this year and nominate us for the Supreme Court. We promise to disagree with everything John Roberts says--if it'll help.