The etymology of phrases

In her latest post , CC asks, “Ever wondered where “That’s what she said” came from?” She’s expecting a negative, for she says, “Me neither…”, but actually I have wondered.

I find the etymology of phrases and picturesque language as fascinating as the etymology of words themselves. They make the difference between informing someone and telling a story; properly used, they produce effects and generate images that one would not have thought mere words capable of. They are the mark of the true educator, author, or journalist.

Their power can be told by the fact that once a particularly effective phrase enters the common vernacular, it gets run into the ground. One such is “fast and furious”- I became curious about this one a couple years ago after reading and/or hearing it spoken seventeen times in a single day. It may well be the single most overused couplet in the English language; many people seem incapable of even saying the word “fast” without completing it.

I started researching it- not seriously, but whenever I thought of it while a resource was available. To date, the oldest use of the phrase I can find is Robert Burns’ poem, “Tam O’Shanter”:
“As Tammie glower'd, amaz'd, and curious,The mirth and fun grew fast and furious…And how Tam stood like ane bewitch'd,And thought his very een enrich'd"

Is anyone aware of an earlier usage?

P.S. If any of you are Cutty Sark fans, are you aware that both the ship and the liquor were named for this poem? The young witch whose dancing so entranced Tam wore a “cutty sark”, which apparently is a nightshirt far too short to answer the call of decency.

P.P.S It occurs to me that an appropriate use of the phrase would be to describe Danica Patrick's walk down pit row in the 500.

The Indiana Voter ID law

Indiana’s Voter ID law has now been upheld by the Supreme Court, and much hooting and hollering has come from the left as a result. One example of such is this opinion piece in the Chicago Tribune, Indiana voters shut out for no rational reason by Steny Hoyer and Chris Dodd. Hoyer & Dodd speak of the requirement that voters who registered before 2007 (if you registered after, you can get the FREE ID on the spot) show some form of photo ID before voting as “…a high hurdle in front of their right to vote—the most fundamental right in a democracy.” They use as their example the case of a dozen nuns who were turned away at the poll in this last election as proof.

Of course when one reads the story, ( Indiana nuns lacking ID denied at poll by fellow sister ), one might well come to another conclusion- especially if one adds a couple details known because one lives here. Point: They had three full years since the law was passed to prepare for this election. Point: The ID is FREE. Point: Even without ID, you’re allowed to cast a provisional ballot and are then given another whole week to present some form of ID. These nuns did none of these things- evidently, because they depended on the poll worker, another nun, to let them in anyway. Unfortunately for them, she obeyed the law.

Hoyer & Dodd claim this law will “…place a disproportionate burden on the thousands who are too poor, too elderly or too disabled to meet rigid ID laws.” Really? Hmm… the law accepts any dated, government issued photo ID- which includes the ID’s issued to almost all recipients of government assistance such as WIC, AFDC, Section 8 housing vouchers, SSI, VA benefits, etc. So the “too poor, too elderly or too disabled” who would have this “disproportionate burden “ would have to be someone who has never driven, never served in the military, never received government assistance, and is just mobile enough to get to a license branch to register to vote, but cannot stay long enough to get his picture taken for the free ID to be issued. That’s a pretty narrow window- so narrow that the first judge to hear the case asked those seeking to strike down the law to give him a single name, a single person in a state of six million who would be so affected… and they couldn’t.

The Democrats opposing this law (and the opposition has been 100% Democratic so far) say that their only motivation is fear that somebody, somewhere might be disenfranchised. Curious… last year, right here in Marion County, Indiana, the new County Clerk botched an election so badly that hundreds of polling places opened hours late, and a dozen never opened at all. This was genuine disenfranchisement- you can’t even cast a provisional ballot if the poll never opens. And not one of these Democratic champions of Voter’s Rights filed a suit, issued a statement, or wrote an op-ed denouncing this clerk for disenfranchising thousands of voters. So what’s the real story, guys?

The soul of the Libertarian Party in the balance

When the Libertarian Party holds its convention in Denver over the Memorial Day weekend, their selection of a candidate for president will be a defining moment for years to come. The leading contender, many pundits say is Bob Barr .

Bob Barr is a former Republican, and very popular among that very set of Republicans most disappointed with the choice of McCain. A “conservative’s conservative”, he had a lead role in the impeachment of President Bill Clinton. He’s a fiscal conservative, and an advocate of the “Fair Tax”, which would bring another disaffected group of voters. He calls for smaller government, and is against the Gulf War. With him at the helm, the Libertarian Party could get a bigger share of the vote than ever before, become a real player the other two parties would have to deal with.
However… he also is many things anathema to the Libertarian spirit. “Bob Barr was a strong supporter of the War on Drugs. He wrote the Defense of Marriage Act. He also voted for the Patriot Act. Bob Barr also proposed that the military ban the practice of Wicca among its ranks…” For someone like me, this makes him a non-starter- it is incomprehensible to me how the Libertarian Party could in good faith accept his application.

Will the Libertarian Party, in the pursuit of the bright elusive butterfly of votes, sell its soul, or will they accept the lesser role of goad and hold to their principles? Am I to be shouldered out of yet another party, to have no political home at all?

Movie review: Iron Man

In a word, fantastic! The best adaptation of a Marvel Comic to a live-action movie yet. The high points:

1. Casting. It would never have occurred to me to cast Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark- which is why casting directors make the big bucks, and I don’t. He and Paltrow captured the relationship between Stark and his Gal Friday Pepper perfectly. Is it just me, or is Jeff Bridges starting to look like Jesse Ventura nowadays?

2. Special effects. It would have been so, so easy to go over the top- but they didn’t. The effects were exactly what was needed to tell the story- perfectly done, but no flash for flash’s sake.

3. The story. In today’s atmosphere, it would have been tempting to make the story a debate on America’s presence in the Middle East- but they told the story of personal crisis of conscience and personal redemption that the original comic book dealt with. It will be interesting to see in the inevitable sequels whether they deal with his alcoholism as well.

As a fan of the original comic book, I couldn’t have asked for better, and didn’t expect it to be this good. If you’ve never read the comic, don’t let that stop you from catching a fine summer flick.

I guess nothing is so bizarre…

That it can’t become normal if you live with it long enough. Consider the newest vacation resort…

“The sands are white, the sea laps gently and crowds of bronzed Americans laze in the Caribbean sunshine.
They have a cinema, a golf course and, naturally, a gift shop stocked with mugs, jaunty T-shirts and racks of postcards showing perfect sunsets and bright green iguanas.”

Where is this ocean front paradise? Welcome to "Taliban Towers" at Guantanamo Bay !

“While the detainees lie incarcerated, visitors can windsurf, take boat trips and go fishing for grouper, tuna, red snapper and swordfish.
The United States' 1.5million service personnel and Guantanamo's 3,000 construction workers are eligible to visit the "resort", which boasts a McDonald's, KFC and a bowling alley.
They even have a Wal-Mart supermarket.”

While most would consider the resort a bargain, "The vacation comes at a knock-down price: just $42 (£20) per night for a suite of air-conditioned rooms, including a kitchen, bathroom, living room and bedrooms.", I think it only fair to note that 300 men are living there at no charge...

The Earth moved

for me- did it move for you, too?

Abortion as an art form

From the Yale Daily News : "Art major Aliza Shvarts ’08 wants to make a statement.

Beginning next Tuesday, Shvarts will be displaying her senior art project, a documentation of a nine-month process during which she artificially inseminated herself “as often as possible” while periodically taking abortifacient drugs to induce miscarriages. Her exhibition will feature video recordings of these forced miscarriages as well as preserved collections of the blood from the process. "

Ok, I know my pro life opinions are a minority view within the UUA, but I kind of hope that even those of my fellow UUs who consider me a Neanderthal are just a little squicked out by this.

update

Yale University issued a statement saying it investigated and found it all to be a hoax that was Shvarts' idea of elaborate "performance art." She stands by her claims, but it sounds thin Yale Daily News

I still want to spit on her, but for different reasons.

Energy breakthrough

"New Method Rapidly Produces Low-Cost Biofuels From Wood, Grass" is the headline of an article in Energy Daily ,describing a revolutionary new method for making biofuels, or "green gasoline," from wood or grasses, a process that would be much less expensive than conventional gasoline or ethanol made from corn. Even if you double the most pessimistic of their cost estimates, this new biofuel would still be less than we're paying for gasoline today. We could be energy independent as quickly as we can build the new type of stills!

Some thoughts inspired by Ms. Kitty

Back on April 2nd, Ms. Kitty (Ms. Kitty's Saloon and Road Show) announced that she was writing a sermon about the wisdom of earth-centered traditions as a source of UUism, and asked for personal insights to share. Being both a fan of hers and a Neopagan, I immediately sat down to jot off a few things for her... and found I couldn't even begin. Much to my surprise, more than a week of introspection resulted instead. If the following thoughts seem a bit disjointed, well, that's just the way they occured to me.

I am a Pagan who fellowships at a UU congregation, not a UU who happened to find new insights in some Pagan writings. ("Looky what I found- a new metaphor!") While most Pagans are flattered that UUs are so interested in their beliefs, and were genuinely dismayed when CUUPS was disaffiliated, we nonetheless share the misgivings of the Native Americans Ms. Kitty mentioned in her resultant sermon ... the feeling that your faith and way of life has been reduced to "a source" in someone else's religious menu. In the Pagan comic strip "Oh My Gods!", the Unitarian character is named UU of 8 - a reference to Star Trek's "Borg", the alien race that has no native culture, assimilating the new cultures they run across instead.

I was surprised at the strength of these sudden emotions, as I've considered myself a good UU for a dozen years. I found myself thinking of the people I know- including a number of bloggers that those reading these words will probably also know- who have either left the UUA or added a second church into their lives to satisfy a spiritual need Uu just couldn't fill. In fact, one of the Pagans who answered Ms. Kitty's call for personal insights, Jamie Goodwin, is one of those. I fully understood Jamie's dilemma when he had announced his decision some months back- I, too, get very little spiritual satisfaction from UU services.

So why do I still attend, I asked myself. Truth is, nostalgia and inertia account for a lot of it. During coffee hour, I can close my eyes and feel Phil, my late and much missed father in law at my side, ready to discuss the sermon. The aisle I walk down to our favorite pew is the same one I walked to get married. We have friends there. Rev. Clear's sermons are still as intriguing as the day I joined a dozen years ago. But the truth is that if we moved to a new town, it's even money I wouldn't find enough at the local UU congregation to bring me back for a second visit, much less join it. UUism simply isn't a stand-alone religion for people like me or Jamie; we need more.

Back in January, I took exception to the following words by Patrick Murfin: "Inclusion of some pagan rites, whether historically accurate or cooked up in some Victorian eccentric’s garden, does not alarm me if the practitioners do not believe that they are literally invoking specific gods, goddesses or spirits who will perform specific tasks or expect the congregation to do so. While there are Wiccans out there—and other organized and semi-organized pagans and neo-pagans—who really, really do believe that every incantation uttered is both real and true, those are not the folks who are comfortable being part of a UU community any more than a Christian who literally believes he/she is consuming the body and blood of Christ in communion will be comfortable." He may have been right for the wrong reasons. The issue is not, as he would have it, that anyone who actually believes in anything is a dangerous fundamentalist.

The real issue is that despite everything else they may have in common that would make them seem natural fellows, one who has felt the presence of the immanent Divine has very little in common with someone who can find genuine spiritual satisfaction and renewal in a mere discussion of nature- especially if the former's path to God is regarded as a mere metaphor for the latter's discussion. These two do not speak the same language; indeed, they just barely share the same reality. Of course they will never be totally comfortable with each other's form of spirituality. They're bound to grate on one another occassionally, even when (especially when?) they're trying to be "tolerant".

And yet both are good UUs- there being no "Pope" of UU to say otherwise. This begs for Ms. Kitty's question to be reversed- what is UU, that studying Earth Centered religions would enhance it? Is there an "it" to be enhanced? Is UU greater than the sum of its sources, or is merely the collective that "UUof8" will assimilate Neopaganism into?

From the sublime to the...?

First watch this indescribable video ...

Then imagine that little girl going into Toys-r-Us for her own tramp stamp tattoo . Coming this summer- plastic practice nipple rings?

The best position on Global Warming- the "Radical Middle"

This story from The Press Association sums up the best policy on Global Warming in the first three paragraphs:

"It would be cheaper and more effective for the world to adapt to global warming rather than fight it, scientists have said.

The scientists - including Mike Hulme, the founding director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia - accept the scientific consensus on the causes and effects of climate change, but differ on what to do about it.

Their view, which has caused them to be labelled "the new pariahs of global warming", is that the world should work to reduce hunger, storm damage and disease, rather than spending trillions of pounds trying to stabilise carbon dioxide levels across the planet."

These thnigs should be mankind's goal with or without Global Warming! What are the fears from Global Warming? Drought? Drought is not a function of weather; it's a function of bad water management and bad planning- heck, most of the third world doesn't have reliable water supplies now. It's one of mankind's greatest shames that there are billions of people without potable water. If we built the aqueducts, viaducts, canals, and where necessary, desalinization plants to serve the people who need it today, a one or two degree average temperature change would not be able to overwhelm the system.

What else? Famine? As I noted previously , the United Nations says enough food exists to end hunger today- not in some wistful future, today. All we need do is build the political trust and the distribution systems. Once such systems were in place, food would be routinely routed from places having bumper crops to places having bad crops. Once again, with such systems in place, Global Warming could not overwhelm it.

What else? Disease? It boggles the mind that the world tolerates millions dying from easily controlable diseases even without Global Warming. We have hot years now- in 2003 there was a heat wave that caused tens of thousands of deaths by heat stroke in Europe- but there were no malaria or encephalitis epidemics. We know how to control these things, and controling the CO2 in the atmosphere isn't the method.

If we cared about our fellow man today, we could worry less about Global Warming tomorrow.

We don't see with our eyes

We've just returned from the previously mentioned trip to Italy a little worse for the wear, being both jetlagged and suffering some upper respiratory thing. This has left me feeling too tired to do any housework, so I've been pondering things I learned on the trip- one of which has to do with human nature in general.

I normally wear a necklace- just a thin black cord with two small pendants, both one inch in diameter. One is a gold UUA symbol, and the other, which usually overlays the chalice, is a silver star. A curious thing is that while I was in Italy, a round dozen noted the star. A couple asked if I was Israeli... one older man at the laundromat spoke of his childhood in Beirut... a Murano glass dealer displayed a beautiful handblown menorah.

Why did I call these encounters curious? Because the pendant is not a Star of David, it is a pentacle. Outside of England, Paganism is virtually unknown in Europe, so when they saw a star, their minds saw the Star of David, not the five-pointed star their eyes were seeing. I didn't bother to correct them- there was too much language barrier to fully explain, and they were being so nice it would have been churlish to try... but it did teach me something.

CC, when you become a lawyer, you might want to remember this lesson about eyewitnesses.

Facing my demons

I haven't made an entry in a while because I've been rather busy- traveling in Italy! We've found a lot of fascinating things traveling together- me, my wife, Ginger, and her mother (who I love), Marcia- but it was on a solo side trip that I found the most fascinating and terrifying experience of the trip so far.

We were in Florence, and a must-see on my list (but nobody else's) was the interior details of Dell Duomo. It's not that I'm a major fan of cathedrals, but this one has a very famous dome- huge, masterpiece painted on the inside, and the world's first example of the "dome within a dome" construction technique later used on our own capitol. Most important of all, you're allowed to climb to the top, within the walls, between the domes, to see the construction techniques all the way to the cupola on top, from where you can see nearly all of Tuscany.

I was slightly apprehensive about the climb, 463 vertical steps, but finally told myself, "So what if you're slow- let 'em go around!" As it happened, the kids did squeeze around me, at first, (at the landings, the stairs themselves were far too narrow for passing- in many places my shoulders touched on either side) After a few hundred steps, however, I was no longer being overtaken, my endurance had outlasted their youthful speed.

When we got up to the base of the dome, the path turned from inside the walls to inside the base of the dome itself- you could look up and see the magnificent paintings overhead, look down and see the marble floors hundreds of feet below. At this point I should mention that I have what other people call a fear of heights, and what I call a fear of falling. The distinction is not a silly one; if I feel secure, I can easily look into the abyss, height makes no difference. I can look out the window of an airplane without fear... but a five foot precepice with no railing can make me nervous. It's purely a question of how secure I feel, not how secure I really am.

This walkway, while high enough to thoroughly squick me out, was solid stone, part of the church; I was able to work my way around to the far side of the dome where it re-entered the wall. From there one climbs another seemingly endless spiral of stairs until one reaches a T intersection: straight to the cupola and observation deck, turn to exit.

Suddenly, I was afraid... I had a good idea why one had to turn to exit. I put it off for a while, but eventually one must exit. There was no question of going back the way I came, even if it were permitted, the tightness of the fit would have meant forcing everyone back down with me. Telling myself, "How bad could it possibly be?", I stepped through the archway labeled "Exit" that I knew would lead me back inside the dome.

It could be bad indeed. This time, the walkway was near the very top of the dome, even with the paintings, this time, the walkway was so narrow that not only did I have to turn sideways to fit, but suck it in, too- my butt pressed against the wall and my lower belly against the railing. A few steps, and some projection on the wall popped a suspender buckle off my pants in back; another step and something in front caught the top button of my pants. I slid my hand down between pants and railing and looked down to see what had caught me.

Here's a funny thing I didn't know about domes: when you're inside one like I was, not on the bottom looking up, it's very disorienting- there's nothing to differentiate "Wall" from "Ceiling"... and when I looked down, my perspective shifted and I was suddenly on the ceiling, looking straight down at the floor 463 steps below, with nothing but a stuck waist button to keep me from falling.

My eyes snapped shut, my head snapped back. I chewed on my tongue to prevent the scream that I knew would never stop if I permitted it to start. Tasting blood, I turned my head left (the direction I had to go) and opened my eyes, hoping to find a focal point to prevent me from looking in other directions. I found my self looking at the portion of the painting that depicts Hell. Well, more specifically at a sinner some demon had speared in the back, the poor guy's arms and legs splayed in agony. OK, to be more precise, I was staring at what this poor sinner, were he a Chuck Berry fan, would call "My Ding-a-ling". As stupid and childish as it sounds, I was able to get control of myself by focusing on a 600 year old painting of a wang.

I was able to start moving again. As I did, my eyes slid to the next figure in Hell- a woman this time. And I noticed something. (I had been anxious to notive something, to occupy my mind) The thing I noticed was that the agonies of Hell had caused her legs to come together, rather than splaying apart as the male sinner's had. This observation created a game to occupy my mind, to keep me from thinking of you know what. As my eyes slid from scene to scene, I noted how male nudity was handled differently from female nudity, and kept a running total of wangs / to whats (say it quickly). When I reached the safety of the stairs down, the count was 11-0.

When I rejoined Ginj and Marcia at the Galleria Dell Accademia, I resumed the count; by the time we left for dinner it was 73-2. Contemplating that count prevented me from having any nightmares.

Now you know how twisted I really am.

I would watch more television

if more ads were like this one.

Cafe standards won't fix it

Raising the CAFE standards is the first thing mentioned by any politician when discussing the oil crisis, and they throw out ambitious (to say the least) numbers- 40, 50, even 100 MPG requirements. I guarantee you one thing: any politician calling for 100 MPG CAFE standards either doesn't understand the problem, or is a lying demagogue. Even 50- as a fleet standard, not for a single model- is a fantasy without a breakthrough in basic technology. It might be possible to reach 35- but that's not enough to solve the problem.

Why do I say this? Three sentences: Force equals Mass times Accelleration. Work equals Force over Distance. Power equals Work over Time. What does that mean? That you can only have two- at best- of the three characteristics- size, performance, economy. A certain level of performance is absolutely required for safety's sake- that's part of why they don't allow bicycles on highways- and a certain size is needed for survivability. Those requirements put limits on the third factor, economy. The smallest car in mass production (it doesn't even pretend to have a back seat) that will accellerate quickly enough to merge on a highway ramp (just barely) or drive in the mountains (possibly), and meet American safety standards is the Smart Car, and it only gets 40 city/45 highway. Hybrid cars, despite some claims, don't do any better in real life. Nothing with an internal combustion engine is ever going to do significantly better, (many people don't realize this, but despite the great strides we've made in reliability and cleanliness, the specific fuel consumption of the internal combustion engine has improved very little in the last 75 years) and there is no technology yet ready to replace it. (See Who killed the electric car? ) These are not Republican or Democratic positions, these are physical realities.

Richard Nixon, for all his other flaws, understood this; that's why he lowered the speed limits instead thirty years ago during the first oil crisis- doesn't anyone remember the double nickel? That is still the only quick answer, if it weren't for the fact that the American public is firmly in Sammy Hagar's camp. Finding an alternative fuel will take longer and be more expensive, specially if you want to reduce the carbon footprint at the same time- hydrogen is the only candidate we have at the moment fitting that description, and we're years away from making that practical. Light rail is not an answer- a rail system extensive enough to seriously cut into our gas consumption would take decades to build, and be so hideously expensive as to be "the moral equivalent of war".

It's time to realize that "I can't drive 55" is just 80s big hair rock, not a lifestyle.

Diabetics look away

Ok, I try not to fill the blog with cutsey pictures- there's way too much of that goin' round anyway... but I can't resist this one .

The last one just blew...

Something under three years ago I bought a dozen fluorescent bulbs to replace the incandescent bulbs in all the household fixtures. (except the chandeliers that use shaped bulbs). I've bought another half-dozen since. The first of the original batch went in less than nine months, and the last of the original batch blew today. Of the eighteen or so I've bought, three remain functional.

Verdict: the experiment is a total failure. They don't last a single day longer than incandescent, and even when they worked, I had to buy or position supplemental lamps to be able to read, write, or do any fine work without glasses. The total dollar cost was never amortized because the claimed "longer life" didn't hold true. Given the much greater manufacturing cost, the energy/carbon difference was never amortized, either, and the environmental impact is also a net loss, given that the fluorescent bulbs contain mercury.

Moral: Even if you believe in Global Warming, don't leap on every bandwagon that claims to be a solution without extensive study- which wasn't really done with the Compact Fluorescent Light. It was an example of what is called "politician's logic"- something must be done; this is something, therefore we must do it. You think I jest? Congress has outlawed the incandescent bulb, beginning 2014, and Bush signed it . This is a lesson for future such measures as well- even if actions of humankind have a significant lobal Warming impact, we must take the time to find out if the unintended consequences of our "solutions" won't make things worse rather than better.

Fascinating optical illusion

Things like this make you question whether we live in the "real" world, or just the version of it we see.

Watch "Meet the Press" this coming Sunday

for a big announcement from consumer advocate and perrenial Presidential candidate Ralph Nader, according to Breitbart.com,"Nader to Discuss Election Plans" . Evidently, Nader has been quietly positioning for another run this year:

"Kevin Zeese, who was Nader's spokesman during the 2004 presidential race, but is no longer working for him, said Friday that Nader has been actively talking to "lots of people on all sorts of levels" about the possibility of making another run.

Zeese said he could only guess what Nader might do, but added: "Obviously, I don't think ("Meet the Press" host) Tim Russert would have him on for no reason.""

Hillary and Barack may have more to worry about than who is plagiarizing whom.

Not again

There’s been another school shooting, this time at Northern Illinois University. As of the moment I write this, six are dead.

Why have there been so many school shootings in recent years? The easy answer that many jump to is the ready availability of guns- but that doesn’t bear close examination.

100 years ago, everything- up to and including cannons and machineguns- were legal. The Tommy gun , the machinegun made famous by the “Untouchables”, was sold mail order, no questions asked. (which is why so many criminals owned it) Only big cities required a license to carry a gun, and there were no restrictions on buying them. There were no school massacres.

When I was a very small child, machineguns were restricted, and you had to be 18 to buy a pistol in most places, but anyone any age could buy a long gun at any hardware store. You could still buy guns mail order. Lee Harvey Oswald obtained the surplus Italian infantry rifle he assassinated JFK with from an ordinary sporting goods store. No school massacres.

When I was a just a little older, Marlin advertised their .22s in comic books, and Col. Larsen, “The Marlin Man”, a famous sharpshooter, would wow kids by shooting through the hole of a Lifesaver candy at shows and fairs. I learned to shoot in the cub scouts. No school massacres.

In high school, I was on the school rifle team, and more than half the high schools had their own firing range. This was after the King and Robert Kennedy assassinations, so there were now more gun laws in place, but I still could, and did, buy a shotgun as a teenager. No waiting periods, no number of guns bought restrictions, no background checks- and no school massacres.

A couple of years ago, Indianapolis set a new homicide record, both in total number and per capita. I researched the records then, and noticed something: there were more non-firearm homicides- fists, knives, and clubs- in that year than there were TOTAL homicides, INCLUDING guns, the year I was born.

All this makes it really difficult to blame the availability of guns for the modern shootings. Guns are harder to obtain than they’ve ever been in my lifetime, but the violence still keeps getting worse. Some people are blaming poor background checks, not keeping guns out of the hands of the mentally ill. But that still doesn’t explain why these school shootings have been happening only these last few years- there were people with mental illnesses fifty years ago.

One needn’t be a Jerry Fallwell to conclude that there’s something wrong with society itself that is behind this- there are other symptoms as well: rampant drug use, illegitimacy and divorce rates so high that less than one child in five is raised to majority in a two-parent household. But that doesn’t mean the past was better- widespread racism, sexism, homophobia, and injustice so bad that children reading of it in school can scarcely conceive how bad it was.

Is Humankind doomed to live at the poles? Are the choices always repression and oppression, or anarchy? Does it always have to be either public prudery or public licentiousness, either censorship or open sewers aimed at our minds? Either Prohibition or crack dealers on every corner? Won’t anyone tell people “No, we don’t act like that. Not because it’s illegal... not because you’ll burn in Hell... but because you’re better than that.”?