Kern Judge Sherry Muttler

Are there rational grounds for religious belief? (various skeptical musings)

If you assume a religious perspective is justifiable by dogma--the mere presence of Scripture--there's really no point in arguing; yet if you think the dogma can be justified rationally (as the jesuits used to assert) you have to overcome all those Phil. 101 chestnuts: the problem of evil, immateriality, status of other faiths, and the basic epistemological issue of why anyone should accept any religion as a true account of reality, rather than say a commnon-sense physico-logico account.

That may be unsubtle, and not very appealing to those who work for Christendom Inc., but theists continually assume that those Phil. 101 issues have been settled in their favor, when of course they haven't been

As you probably know, Kant himself rejected all the classical arguments for a deity, and there are I think far more philosophers and scientists arranged on the skeptic side (e..g, that there are no convincing, rational grounds for religious truth, or for an omniscient and just God) then there are rational theists. There does not seem to be a shortage of irrational theists however.

* * *

Is the existence of miracles used to confirm the truth of Scripture? If it is, then obviously other religons and cults claim miraculous events (though I assert wrongly), so the mere presence of claims that a miracle occurred doesn't really prove anything: that water was instantly converted to wine is about like saying the Buddha levitated. One can believe that, I guess, just as people believe in astrology. But most theists believe that there's more to the plausibility of scripture than the presence of miracles; if not, it would be a situation of which cult features the best miracles (and all the creepy pagans and occultists in LA would say their's does).

In fact the catholic church routinely confirms miracles, yet as Chris Hitchens recently pointed out in a great essay on Mother Theresa's death, the confirmaton is in no way scientific or objective: it's usually based on flimsy, anecdotal evidence (and an incredibly sentimental process as well). It may be thought such claims of miracles are amusing or charming, but as Hitchens points out, the belief in miracles acutally does great damdge to rationality as a whole.

I shall let Mr. Hitchens speak for himself (and for rationality), since he does it much better than I:

"Those of us who are against miraculous claims for the more obvious reasons--that the laws of nature do not respond to petitions and that what can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without proof--have a tendency to forget that this vulgarity and hysteria also increases the sum of misery on Earth, without at all diminishing it in the false promise of the afterlife."

* * *

Quote (from Christian blogger):

"in order to do that without actually investigating each miracle- or religious experience-claim, you'd need to give arguments for why we shouldn't believe in miracles or see religious experience as evidentially weighty"

In other words, prove to you that pigs don't fly. I have never seen a flying pig in person or photos. I don't know anyone that has, and never read any history indicating that pigs do fly. I did see a drawing of one with wings on a website. But it was not flying.

You are right, though to some degree: all the laws and rules of physical science could be overturned tomorrow and pigs might fly, just as Hume said tomorrow his billard table might obey different physical laws--I would agree there is no logically necessary reason why physical laws could not be overturned. But I'd wager the probability of the pig flying ( or billard balls flying backwards after the break of the table) is about the same as Jesus out strolling on the waves or the Virgin of Guadalupe making her annual appearance in the reflection of some campesino's windshield or whatever. I think Bayes theorem shows this too: each day a miracle has not been confirmed increases the unlikeliness of the original anomaly having occurred.


Mystical experiences are another thing. I don't doubt many people have those experiences, but they in no way demonstrate or confirm theological concepts. Recently some experiments have shown that the mental state produced by monks and nuns meditating or praying can be electrically stimulated in various brain lobes. So what was thought to be a calm "oneness with god" or satori was in fact some biochemical process in the corpus callosum.

* * *

Does that imply that if there are no rational grounds for accepting the all-powerful, spiritual Being then there are no grounds for His morality either? If there are no rational grounds for either Christianity or pagan feminism (and I don't think there are) then any laws or policies based on those irrational ideologies would not seem to be permissable. I.e if you allow one cult's morality it would seem you would have to allow all major cults be represented. (Should laws be allowed which are based on Astrology? And Christianity is in many ways akin to astrology)

Re: The Schiavo ordeal

If there were no specific, written instructions indicating that a patient preferred to die rather than be left in a vegetative state, I think the doctors and courts should presume she would desire to live (and thus feed her, keep her on machine, etc.). I don't see that as a necessarily conservative perspective, but as a humanist and ethical one. A ruling that said the state could terminate the life in absence of those written instructions could certainly lead to some scary scenarios: doctors "pulling the plug" on anyone who was in a coma who had not signed some release or consent or whatever: a bad precedent.

Moreover, there are no logical reasons why a cure or new surgical technique could not be discovered; her recovery might be highly unlikely, but it's not impossible. And how does the hospital know that her husband and/or relatives are reporting the truth about her wishes? And yes we should be very alarmed that the appelate court did seem to decide against the patient's rights here.

There should be a federal law that presumes that, unless there is clear and reliable written evidence to the contrary, the patient desires to live and thus should be fed, kept on machines, etc.

Big Tony Scalia, Supreme Court Seditionist

Not that many notice or seem to mind, but Antonio Scalia, Supreme Court Justice-for-life, routinely contradicts the principles of the Constitution with nearly each court opinion he hands down. Commenting on a case involving the legitimacy of having the Ten Commandments displayed outside a Texas courthouse, Scalia recently asserted that political authority does not derive from the people, claiming that the displaying of the Ten Commandments “is a symbol of the fact that government comes — derives its authority from God.”

Justice Scalia must have missed out on his Constitutional Law course, for a cursory reading of the opening Preamble reveals that it begins with “We the people.” References to “God” or Judeo-Christian scripture are nowhere to be found. Indeed, Founding Fathers of both the right (such as Hamilton) and left (Jefferson), influenced by Locke's concepts of individual rights, rejected theological authority as well as monarchical authority. It is not unfair to claim that a great deal of the intellectual justification of the American Revolution thus was in essence opposed to the theocratic assumptions regularly espoused by Scalia and the fundamentalists.

Those people who do value a secular society—e.g., one based on reason and democratic politics instead of religious dogma--might ask themselves whether Justice Scalia should be held accountable for such un-American comments and behavior.

Progressive Taxation is Good


The question of taxation relates, at least in part, to meritocracy: should a just or democratic society allow individuals of equal talents and abilities--say a smart high school math teacher and a Bill Gates--to have hugely disproportionate incomes? Let's assume the small-town math teacher and Gates (or whatever IT baron you care to instantiate) earn similar scores on an objective, quantitative skills test. Should the math teacher thus have the same income as Gates? (Or in other words, shouldn't wealth have something to do with measurable worth)? I think not--it's Gates whose income and wealth should be limited, i.e., readjusted and/or seized.

Pure capitalism leads to a society of speculators and gamblers, where the individual's fate depends on the whims of the market and of other wealthy (or their henchmen, ie, management). Progressive taxation thus is justified not only to protect public services but to keep the playing field from tilting towards plutocracy. Raising capital gains taxes and allowing taxes on luxury items, second homes, SUVs, etc, is more than justified to correct the imbalances of power ( i.e wealth) that the free market leads too. Even small increases in taxation on the very wealthy bracket could substantially reduce deficits, budget crisis, create better schools, etc. etc. Indeed the argument should be at what point does the govt. step in and seize the assets and funds of the uber wealthy such as a Gates, Ellison, Allen.


Some "classical" economists (i.e. Ricardo and Keynes) argued for high taxation on estates and those who inherited large pieces of property. A high tax would keep the inheritors from becoming the types of aristocratic or feudal "rentiers" who earn large sums of money for simply inheriting or obtaining large pieces of property. The same argument applies to speculation--while you and I are grading scantrons or papers or administering networks or even slamming nails into drywall or digging ditches, the speculator or rentier derives far more capital simply for doing nothing but for being fortunate enough to have inherited an estate or win big on the stock market (or for that matter having succeeded in organized crime). Marx obviously had a solution to that, but barring Marx it seems quite prudent to implement a tax system that would prevent the resurgence of a landed aristocracy.

And let's be honest: the average academic economist, like the average successful conservative, is pretty much of the Hamiltonian-aristo-protestant variety; he views the poor and probably even the middle class, especially minorities, as deserving of their fate. Higher taxes mean punishing the successful, the noble and the Good, and giving their hard -earned cash (even if from stocks or rents) to the rabble. The protestant sort of economist thus also is a Social Darwinist to some extent. To be poor or unsuccessful in neo-puritan America entails that you are somehow not fit, morally or intellectually, not that the market and corporate America or the bureaucratic state (including its universities) might have exploited you for years.

Should American patriotic holidays be permitted?

Recently I read some comments from a neo-conservative blogger arguing that Americans need to return to a sort of "civic republicanism"; my own perspective is that this flag-waving "civic republicanism"' is, if not identical to nationalism (in a sense an irrational patriotism), quite close to it. It's quite a basic argument, though I guess the premises could be debated:

--If America's political leaders have been, since the inception of the Republic, guilty of committing political and military atrocities, then celebrations of American patriotism are not justifiable.


--America's political leaders are guilty of committing political and military atrocities over the last 229 years or so. (for instance, Founding Fathers were found to be racist, supporters of slavery, or dedicated to eradicating Native Americans, and the military injustly violated treaties, committed military blunders or outright brutalities which cost the lives of thousands in WWII, Korea, and Vietnam, etc.)

--Thus celebrations of American patriotism (including parades, miltary celebrations, even President's, Memorial, Veteran's day) are not justifiable.

Bill Moyers on X-tian Doomsday

"There are millions of Christians who believe the Bible is literally true, word for word. Some of them—we'll come back to the question of how many— subscribe to a fantastical theology concocted in the nineteenth century by two immigrant preachers who took disparate passages from the Bible and wove them with their own hallucinations into a narrative foretelling the return of Jesus and the end of the world. Google the "Rapture Index" and you will see just how the notion has seized the imagination of many a good and sincere believer (you will also see just where we stand right now in the ticking of the clock toward the culmination of history in the apocalypse). It is the inspiration for the best-selling books in America today—the twelve novels in the Left Behind series by Christian fundamentalist and religious- right warrior Tim LaHaye, a co- founder with Jerry Falwell of the Moral Majority.

The plot of the Rapture—the word never appears in the Bible although some fantasists insist it is the hidden code to the Book of Revelation—is rather simple, if bizarre. (The British writer George Monbiot recently did a brilliant dissection of it and I am indebted to him for refreshing my own insights.) Once Israel has occupied the rest of its "biblical lands," legions of the Antichrist will attack it, triggering a final showdown in the valley of Armageddon. As the Jews who have not been converted are burned the Messiah will return for the Rapture. True believers will be transported to heaven where, seated at the right hand of God, they will watch their political and religious opponents writhe in the misery of plagues—boils, sores, locusts, and frogs—during the several years of tribulation that follow.

........

For them the invasion of Iraq was a warm-up act, predicted in the Book of Revelation, where four angels "bound in the great river Euphrates" will be released "to slay the third part of man." A war with Islam in the Middle East is not something to be feared but welcomed—an essential conflagration on the road to redemption. The last time I Googled it, the Rapture Index stood at 144—approaching the critical threshold when the prophesy is fulfilled, the whole thing blows, the Son of God returns, and the righteous enter paradise while sinners will be condemned to eternal hellfire."

Moyers

McCarthyite Language Tactics

Joseph McCarthy was an American senator who made a career in the 50's by accusing various humans of being communists or having some association with communist or left-wing organizations. His tactics, such as guilt by association, defamation of character, insinuations about a person's political and sexual life, are still used by many morally corrupt persons, especially those involved with communication: bureaucrats, politicians, journalists, academics. Although usually and correctly identified with various propagandists of the right-wing, McCarthyite tactics are used by liberals as well, especially by those types of putative liberals who are dedicated to "identity politics."

McCarthyite tactics are of course logical fallacies--simply because someone attended a leftist rally against death squads in El Salvador while in college does not imply that the person is a marxist or socialist. Many former college students who diligently read Marx and supported the Sandinistas are now respectable suburban professionals making regular house and car payments--hopefully they haven't come full circle and voted for the GOP, right?


McCarthyism is really about power and control: instead of logic or debate or evidence, slander and libel are employed to destroy perceived enemies, thus valuable ideas and debates are kept from becoming discussed, and intellectual reputations are ruined by means of insinuation. Labels and terms are essential to the McCarthyite: "red" was the favorite, now it's become just "knee-jerk or bleeding-heart liberal" or even democrat as an insult.


Accusing or speculating about someone's sex habits is another tactic of McCarthyites of both right and left: by conveniently placing a "gay" label, on someone's ideas or character that accused person's logic and argument or evidence is thereby discredited. For instance, a typical Republican idiot most likely makes the following assumptions: X is opposed to say the recall of Davis. Thus X is not supporting the GOP, he is therefore a democrat and advocates socialist policies and is probably gay. X of course may not be a democrat or socialist or "gay", but GOP idiot will assume that X is in reality all of those things and will make his assumptions known to his cronies as well.


Mockery of a person's appearance is another McCarthyite tactic. Davis is attacked in cartoons and in print as a small and therefore weak person--caricature is a favorite and useful tactic of propagandists. Schwarzneggers are approved and Davis and Ralph Nader types are not: consumer masses are drawn to heroes, to macho men that represent physical strength, and nerds such as Nader and Davis's are viewed with suspicion by the generally anti-intellectual and violent mob.


An organization may use these tactics as well. A student finds a professor to be injust and biased and has some confrontations. Said professor then punishes student by giving him a B when he earned an A. And Professor spreads the word in the Department that student is a radical, a troublemaker, a rabble rouser, or straight (being straight is viewed as a flaw in many modern college departments) or gay or from a rich family or from wrong side of the tracks or Westside or Eastside or he' s a caucasian or a mexican or black or WHATEVER. In fact this sort of herd mindset might be discovered at most UCs and CSUs---where many professors, especially those who teach "qualitative courses," care little about real merit or accomplishments but attempt to determine a person's "character" and then assign grades. There are plenty of McCarthyite-minded professor dolts, and, surprisingly, many of them are putative "liberals" or feminists.

RIP Hunter S. Thompson

Interesting reminiscence on Thompson:

HST

Gonzo

"We were somewhere around Barstow on the edge of the desert when the drugs began to take hold."

HST On Republicans:
“In a nation run by swine, all pigs are upward-mobile and the rest of us are f-ed until we can put our acts together: Not necessarily to win, but mainly to keep from losing completely.”

On Nixon:
“If there were any such thing as true justice in this world, his rancid carcass would be somewhere down around Easter Island right now, in the belly of a hammerhead shark.”


I'm saddened at HST's bowing out, but it's a fairly understandable response to an absurd world for an old rebel in not great health...due to a miserable hangover? bitch problems? strapped for cashola? Bush re-election? dope connection vamanosed...some ho-wood mafia intrigue

Dylan Thomas yawped it better than I ever shall:

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

* * *

Cynical addendum: Offing yourself in a room next to where your son and 6 yr. old grandson are located might be gonzo, but it doesn't seem too ethical or sane. And there's a bit too much bad craziness in HST's oeuvre.

I don't think HST was of the genius sort. He came from the sportswriting department. His political writing and columns ( especially his old Herald Examiner stuff in LA) packed a punch but he was no Mencken, certainly no Bertrand Russell or Pynchon. Kerouac's writing, however unfocused, also contained more heart and profundity than Dr. Gonzo's savage journey into the American Dream. Like Mailer, HST's machoism and violence is tiresome, even if funny--and there are some rumors that HST was a bit more perverse and criminal than one would think.

We should attempt to overlook his "character flaws" but in many ways he personifies much of the 60s and 70s excesses. Gonzo reminds me of old, bad rock & roll albums I would rather forget, too many hippies and freaks who unthinkingly bought into the entire 60's ethos. I listen to Stravinsky and Coltrane and Debussy while commuting, web-surfing, or working, not drug-crazed Marin cowboys or Malibu minstrels. I have witnessed too many people's lives ruined by alcohol and narcotics to join in the gonzo par-tay, and I suspect others might object to his incessant praise of drugs and alcohol and his rude and even redneck perspective.

His unpolitically-correct views and his attacks on repugs were needed but he was lacking, well, a certain modicum of rationality.


His strange exit may remind us of the existentialist's meditations on suicide (Camus thought it was the central philosophical problem), or perhaps the buddhist monks who during the height of 'Nam bombing immolated themselves. He might have been a bit more of a decent phreak and taped the event for us.

Kern War Profiteers: Bechtel

"On April 17 [2003], Bechtel received one of the first and largest of the rebuilding contracts in Iraq. Worth $680 million over 18 months, the contract includes the rebuilding, repair and/or assessment of virtually every significant element of Iraq's infrastructure, from power generation facilities to electrical grids to the municipal water and sewage systems. The contract was granted in backroom deals without open and transparent bidding processes and the content remains hidden behind a veil of secrecy. The contract has not been publicly disclosed to American taxpayers, who will be paying the majority of the bill. While there is no doubt that Bechtel has experience in these areas, it is an experience from which the people of Iraq should be spared.

War profiteering and political cronyism is just part of this story."

CorpWatch

Herr Doktor Mike Von Fleichmann: Judo Coach, Shakespearean, and CrimeFighter

Perhaps you’ve heard of C-SUB Professor Mike Fleichmann. A Shakespeare Instructor and Judo coach (no lie) on the Cal State dole, Fleichmann also is a crony of Ed Jagels (the notorious Kern DA who was slammed in Rolling Stone a few months ago) and other notable Central California right-wing extremists. Mike, like any decent Californian neo-fascist, works real hard at his job and has been rewarded for his service to Truth amd Judo with awards from the John Birch Society or something—-he has been awarded Cal State Bootlicker of the Year numerous times.

Mike somehow got it in his head, back at the University of Skokie or whereever he bought his PhD, that Literature might be profitably implemented for right-wing ideological ends; thus he makes a living (at the taxpayer’s expense) passing off his Shakespeare/Himmler pep rallies to those gullible Kern citizens who flock to lit. classes in search of culture. Kernoids, however, don't receive culture in Mike's classes--though they do get Fleichmann’s lectures in "How To Be A Great Machiavellian", with the MikeMeister often using Antonio from the Tempest as his role model, though he does have some problems with the Bard's polysyllabic syntax.




If you have read Ellison’s Invisible Man you remember the cynical and corrupt college administrator Bledsoe. Like the usual Cal State professorial hack, Fleichmann IS another Bledsoe, but lacking Bledsoe’s deadpan irony and verbal sophistication. CSUB has plenty of other Bledsoes, other incompetent hatchetmen and women, some of them quite pathological if not psychotic in character, such as Bi Mama Plugowski. Big Mama P. (a feminist member of the politically correct Kern Vichy French, contrasted but not opposed to Von Fleichmann's Wehrmacht), could not divide fractions correctly, but she does know some French and has read lots of Ginny Woolfe, and manages, in a very consistent manner, to consistently distort the Deep Thinkers, in the name of “post-structuralism” or “hermeneutics” or some crap. Confronting Mama P. with a syllogism would most likely cause her to have a nervous breakdown, but really, kids, it’s better to get some entertainment from the resident Crazy Circus Lady of C-SUB than suffer through a Seminar in Drama of the 3rd Reich with Herr Fleichmann from Skokie.

Verbatim quote from Assemblywoman Sharon Runner's website, on The Issues:

"It is time to establish an equitable funding system in order to ensure that no community college student is funded at an adequate level regardless of where they live in California."

Appears as if Miss Runner could have used that Bonehead English or logic class at Tumbleweed Tech, instead of Trailer Park Marketing 101....

The Honorable Sharie Mae intended to say something like "all students are entitled to adequate funding regardless of their geographic location," but she, alas, has not quite attained a 12th grade level of language skills: thus, in effect, she asserts that NO student should have adequate funding.


Assemblywoman Sharie Mae Runner, 36th District...howdee


Sharie and George Runner, like their boss Ahhnuld the King, recently have turned their attention to pedagogy. That should be pretty amusing, though sadly so, to any person who has managed to pass a few college classes. Sharie unlikely could follow her Bible College griddlecakes recipe correctly, and you know she couldn't distinguish standard deviation from her Standard Revised Version of the Good Book. George, from the renowned University of Redlands, located somewhere in a mall off the I 15, claims to be an business or econ. major, but for some reason methinx he gets most of his "deep thoughts" from the Book of Revelations. So not only the 3 R's, but an extra R for Rapture: "All students meet in the gym for "Rapture Awareness Days"..."


Senator George Runner

I recently had a political-historical realization--deep thought time: although they think they are "patriots," hicks such as the Runners and the "Walmart baptist" type of conservatives, are not, let's be honest, real Americans. Even conservative Founding Fathers such as Adams and Hamilton--really an English aristocrat in disguise and quite a tyrant-- supported the secular Constitution and were opposed to theocracy. More moderate and liberal "Fathers"--Madison and obviously Jefferson himself--would I think have supported John Kerry, reluctantly. TJ, somewhat of a Stoic and a rationalist, would not have found much in common with what currently passes for a Democrat (tho TJ did voice support for Abolition it may be recalled), but he would have opposed and fought the rise of the corporate capitalists and the militarists, and the redneck fundamentalist grunts who support them.

From Petr Kropotkin, 'War!' (1914)


“What Germany, France, Russia, England and Austria are struggling for at this moment, is not military supremacy but economic supremacy, the right to impose their manufactures, their custom duties, upon their neighbours; the right to develop the resources of peoples backward in industry; the privilege of making railways through countries that have none, and under that pretext to get demand of their markets, the right, in a word, to filch every now and then from a neighbour a seaport that would stimulate their trade or a province that would absorb the surplus of their production. When we fight nowadays it is to ensure our Factory Kings a bonus of thirty per cent, to strengthen the “Barons” of finance in their hold on the money market, and to keep up the rate of interest for shareholders in mines and railways. If we were only consistent, we should replace the lion on our standard with a golden calf, their other emblems by money bags, and the names of our regiments, borrowed formerly from royalty, by the titles of the Kings of Industry and Finance - “Third Rothschild,” “Tenth Baring,” etc. We should at least know whom we were killing for.”

Literature, entertainment, censorship

From Book X of the Republic: "And now since we have reverted to the subject of poetry, let this our defense serve to show the reasonableness of our former judgment in sending away out of our State an art having the tendencies which we have described; for reason constrained us. But that she may impute to us any harshness or want of politeness, let us tell her that there is an ancient quarrel between philosophy and poetry; of which there are many proofs, such as the saying of 'the yelping hound howling at her lord,' or of one 'mighty in the vain talk of fools,' and 'the mob of sages circumventing Zeus,' and the 'subtle thinkers who are beggars after all'; and there are innumerable other signs of ancient enmity between them."



In Plato's ideal state, lyric poetry-- which is the product not of reason and logic, but of inspiration and emotion--shall be banned. This section is often criticized and attacked as an early example of state censorship; it also demonstrates, however, that the greeks perceived a clear distinction between the aesthetic and logical approaches to "truth".

Without getting longwinded or too theoretical, I think this distinction--as well as the argument for banning or controlling artistic and poetic creation--still holds. The latest brain fart spewed on some bubblegum star or rapper's CD is not near to Newtonian (or Einsteinian) constants, nor even to a syllogism. Poetry and really literature as a whole are anecdotally true at best and not on the same level as physical or mathematical laws. Literature may have psychological and occasionally historical relevance, yet it is not proof of any psychological theory or concept or the historical record itself. It's qualitative, not quantitative. Most students know far more about Hamlet, an imaginary "construct," than they do about English (or Danish) history of the 16th century, and Shakespeare's abiding presence ( really somewhat sinister) demonstrates how the literary myth overpowers the historical and economic reality of the Tudorian monarchy. Shakespeare's play Hamlet is, however rhetorically marvelous, not the historical record, nor does it contain any necessarily true statements regarding politics, psychology, or the physical world. Entertainment, much lower than classic poetry, is far less concerned with/addressed to any sort of logical or scientific truth.

Though many so-called liberals protest any forms of censorship, there may be decent grounds for the Chinese authorities controlling the spread of discos and pop culture in their country; and though a complete banning of western entertainment in the islamic countries may seem wrong--it is--controlling the spread of the religion of celebrity and instant gratification may not be the worst thing a country can do. Citizens in Morocco or China or Saudi Arabia should be able to read Shelley or Hemingway, listen to Bartok or Ellington or Metheny, I think, but do they need to have their kids listening to gangsta rap and Britanny Spears and death metal or reading Hustler? I think not. But the danger is letting religious zealots be the Ministers of Information, instead of Platos.

"HOG, n. A bird remarkable for the catholicity of its appetite and serving to illustrate that of ours.



Porcus Episcopalia, vr. San Joaquin

Reichmarshall

Let them eat Noir

Most humans are at least vaguely aware of "noir", having watched The Maltese Falcon, or parts of it, during late night brew or chronic sessions. And Bogie as Sam Spade is classic noir; as are Peter Lorre and Sidney Greenstreet as the villains. Dashiell Hammett, the author of The Maltese Falcon was perhaps the American master of noir fiction, and his own life was quite dark --he was imprisoned in the early 50's for some time after refusing to rat out some of his pals suspected of being communists. Hammett's noir is as to the point as a Dempsey jab, with no frills, though with touches of irony and absurd comedy ( Lorre does the comic villain well); lit. types might classify it as "urban realism", but there is much more to it than mere realism.




Noir is a 20th century phenomena, really, perhaps foreshadowed by Poe in his non-supernatural tales such as the Purloined Letter and Murders of the Rue Morgue or Conan-Doyle's stories of Holmesian deduction; it's not about spooks, it's dark but not ghoulish. The noir of Hammett or Raymond Chandler is, however, much more gritty and "hardboiled" than Conan-Doyle's somewhat sentimental Edwardian tales. The language of Hammett or Chandler is pared down from Poe or Conan Doyle's more literary and elegant style; it's sexier, cocky, and with less gloss. Sam Spade is no British gentleman as was Holmes, and he's able to handle himself in a street fight. ( And remember to never mistake noir for dull, pissy English murder mysteries set in manors or european railroad stations).

Hemingway also wrote some noirish stories ( the Killers, the Battler) and Chandler shows some Papa-like influence, though I suspect that Hem. was also influenced by the noir writers. Like Hemingway the diction of noir is simplified, often macho--the speech of cops, lawyers, detectives, criminals, floozies, waitresses, losers. Jim Thompson is another classic noir writer though a bit more primitive than say Chandler. His book The Grifter's is a great story of losers and racetrack creeps, and a decent movie; After Dark, My Sweet is another Thompson fave, and the movie, with Jason Patric, is really superior to the book. In bad noir hacks such as Spillane the cliches can, however, become ridiculous, and obviously Ho--wood churns out bad noir year after year.

The cinematic productions of noir fiction have not been so faithful to the text. Chandler's books--say The Big Sleep--were distorted and if you read the book with any understanding you might find Bogart as Phillip Marlow a bit miscast. Bacall seems to do the heiress well, but Marlow is a big guy--200 lbs, 6 ft. or so. Bogie is a great Sam Spade, but as Marlow he seems ineffectual. Mitchum does Marlow very effectively in Farewell, My Lovely.

Though noir might be thought of as macho , it's also romantic; Chandler's stories usually feature some hot if conniving starlets or washed-up, uh, courtesans. The traditional heros and villains of literature are absent in noir; there are antiheroes, women are not always angels or whores; there's a note of modern ambiguity. The white hats and black hats of westerns are gone, as are the saloon gals with the hearts of gold; or perhaps as in some of Chandler's more bitter visions such as Red Wind, everyone seems to be a black hat.

Though noir is often categorized in the "pulp" file, many scholars are coming to realize that Chandler and Hammett's visions are as worthy to be called "literature" as well, say Fitzgerald or Hemingway's writings. Noir presents the urban spectacle unsentimentally, and at its best without some obvious moral--and in Chandler, corruption, amorality and nihilism are the central motifs. Yet there is more than a hint of a leftist vision to Hammet and even to some of Chandler's writing. In the world of Noir--say in Farewell, My Lovely--corruption extends from the dives and shacks of Burbank to the mansions of Bel Air, and it seems about everyone is on the ol' payola.

James Ellroy is a modern noir master, though his writing is far more graphic, violent, and yes obscene than Chandler or Hammett's; the movie LA Confidential was made from one of his novels. Nonetheless Ellroy's wildly discordant visions of LA-- sort of Ornette Coleman with say Stan Kenton--have a flavor of authenticity to them, and a note of real tragedy....

Noir influenced the Beats, as any discerning reader of say Kerouac's "The Subterraneans" realizes; "cyberpunk" writers such as PK Dick and William Gibson also owe much to Chandler's keen style--and Gibson's crisp noir prose in Count Zero or Virtual Light is a refreshing change from the dull wooden language of earlier sci-fi such as Heinlein and Asimov.

Noir : c'est la vie

Protestant Doomsday Agenda

I have encountered more than a few protestant nutcases in my time who believe in the literal truth of the Book of Revelations; many of them, if not most, also believe in a literal "rapture". There are little videotapes on it--mostly out of Tejas or Okiehoma or some Dixie protestant nutcase seminary. And people are, in the Dixie Rapture vision, literally whisked off the earth to Beulahland in the midst of a nuclear holocaust or other nightmare (when Satan's legions take over or something. )

House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R–Texas), who has quite a bit of control over the agenda in the House, does seem to be one of these prot. nutcase types (though there are plenty of catholic nutcases and deviants to be found--pagan nutcases are not so uncommon either). Bush II himself has indicated that the Book of Revelations is one of his "political" guideposts, a comment which should scare the shit out of all of us. The Book of Rev. is certainly one of the most bizarre pieces of religious writings to be found in that "old book" (as Thoreau said).

These modern-day Ezekiels and Revelators might do some re-reading of the Founding Fathers' rather skeptical comments on "End Time" theology--for instance, Jefferson, who claimed that Revelations was the work of a deranged mind. TJ realized that the protestant Rapture based on the Book of Rev. should be quite troubling to any rational person.

Perhaps some of you have heard of dispensationalism. It's a sort of uberCalvinist notion that Xtians are forgiven of ANY sins (e.g. crimes) at all times simply by being Xtians and attending Church, and "acceptin' Jee-suss as their personal savior" etc. In other words, the church-going, "faithful" Xtian can do whatever he wants and is forgiven simply because he's Xtian. There's more than a hint of that in much of the US right-wing agenda. The muslims have a scary rapture notion though too. And the leftist pagans are about as nauseating. As someone recently said on the Fray, the rightwingers are closet brownshirts, yet the leftists have become blackshirts....


Doomsday, thanks to Jeee-suusss

Excerpt: Dr. ML King's "Letter from the Birmingham Jail"

"You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954 outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us consciously to break laws. One may won ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there fire two types of laws: just and unjust. I would be the Brat to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all"

"Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distort the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I-it" relationship for an "I-thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and awful. Paul Tillich said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression 'of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness? Thus it is that I can urge men to obey the 1954 decision of the Supreme Court, for it is morally right; and I can urge them to disobey segregation ordinances, for they are morally wrong.

Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal."

MLK-Jail
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To the stall the people come to go,
Reading an obscene graffito.