Moving past tragedy to farce

But it's still comedy to me:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Health and Human Services nominee Kathleen Sebelius recently corrected three years of tax returns and paid more than $7,000 in back taxes after finding "unintentional errors"—the latest tax troubles for an Obama administration nominee.

The Kansas governor explained the changes to senators in a letter dated Tuesday that the administration released. She said they involved charitable contributions, the sale of a home and business expenses...

Yeah, well, I guess we should have expected nothing less. At least it wasn't for a limo driver.

So if we got rid of the income tax, would we even have to hold confirmation hearings any more?

Partial credit

Since as might be expected, there has been no agreement between GM's bondholders, unions, and the company on how they can save their collective bacon, Obama does the unexpected:

President Barack Obama said Monday that neither General Motors nor Chrysler has proposed sweeping enough changes to justify further large federal bailouts, and demanded "painful concessions" from creditors, unions and others as their price for survival.

Obama also raised the possibility of a controlled bankruptcy to help either or both "restructure quickly and emerge stronger" —uttering the term that industry and union officials have warned repeatedly could lead to the collapse of an entire domestic industry.

"...we cannot make the survival of our auto industry dependent on an unending flow of tax dollars*."

Obama's proposal is not exactly a denial of more bailout money, packed as it is with working capital for GM, potential loans for Chrysler, and impending tax breaks, incentives, and warranty takeovers for everyone else. It's more of a bargaining position. But at least it's a better bargaining position than Bush's was**.

I was completely wrong on this one; I did not expect Obama to so publicly reject the plans. And I'll give the guy his props for being willing to say what needs to be said - bankruptcy - whether the company or the union likes it or not.

That said, those props will be held in abeyance until the flow of tax dollars actually ends. Whoever said talk is cheap never lived in Washington.

* he added, blatantly ignoring the fact that it already is.

** "Are you sure you don't need more money?"

Psalm 12: an exposition

Psalm 12 is “ground zero” in the KJV-only debate, or more specifically Psalm 12:6-7 is. One will see these verses front and center in any debate about whether we have the pure and unadulterated words of God in the KJV (and only in the KJV):

“The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.”
- Ps. 12:6-7

These 2 verses always appear without context in KJV-only material, and without that context it is obvious that the “them” being preserved in verse 7 is nothing less than the “words of the LORD” in verse 6. From that conclusion it becomes foundational that God preserved his very words somewhere, and it is not surprising that KJV-only advocates assert that that place is nowhere other than the KJV. But is it that simple? It seldom is, as a look at the verse in context will show.

I have reproduced all 8 verses of the KJV version of Psalm 12 below. However, it is sans verse divisions*, which will give far better insight into the whole psalm. If you can handle the English – it's tough but manageable – go ahead and read it though a few times. I'll wait on the other side:

“Help, LORD; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men. They speak vanity every one with his neighbour: with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak. The LORD shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things: Who have said, With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us? For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the LORD; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him. The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever. The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.”
-- Psalm 12 (KJV)

The most important questions we can ask about the whole psalm are who wrote it, to whom is it written, for what purpose was it written, and what's going on. We shall try to answer these questions in the verse-by-verse exposition below.

v1 Help, LORD**; for the godly man ceaseth; for the faithful fail from among the children of men.

The first line sets out the purpose of David's psalm, this prayer song to God. Good, faithful men are becoming scarce. The rest of the psalm should be interpreted with this theme in mind.

v2 They speak vanity every one with his neighbour: with flattering lips and with a double heart do they speak.

So who are “they”? Obviously they are not the godly and faithful of verse 1; rather those who speak with a double heart are the ones who are causing the problem from verse 1. These two groups will be in contrast throughout the the whole psalm.

v3 The LORD shall cut off all flattering lips, and the tongue that speaketh proud things:
v4 Who have said, With our tongue will we prevail; our lips are our own: who is lord over us?

Into this dynamic a third actor is introduced, God, who opposes the proud. He clearly sides with the righteous but “failing” group, threatening to figuratively cut off lips that are speaking pridefully i.e. to shut the proud up.

v5 For the oppression of the poor, for the sighing of the needy, now will I arise, saith the LORD; I will set him in safety from him that puffeth at him.

God here declares his intention to do something about the problem, that men have moved beyond pride to oppressing the poor and needy, which is poetic shorthand for the powerless righteous. It modifies our theme a bit: good men are not just disappearing, they are disappearing because they are being oppressed by the more powerful wicked. Evil is winning, and God assures David that he will do something about it.

v6 The words of the LORD are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times.

Here David speaks about the words of God. They are “pure words,” as pure is silver with the impurities completely removed. In other words, David is declaring his faith that God's words are as “good as gold.” If God says he's going to do something, then by gum he's going to do it.

v7 Thou shalt keep them, O LORD, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.

David declares to God his faith that God will preserve “them.” Now, here is the issue with KJV-only literature. To what does “them” refer, the “words” in v6 or the “poor” and “needy” of the prior verse? We will seek to answer that question below.

v8 The wicked walk on every side, when the vilest men are exalted.

David notes that when evil men are raised up, evil abounds. However, this is no longer the problem for David that it might have been, since God has promised to intervene and David has accepted that promise at face value.

So back to the KJV issue, we have two choices for the interpretation of verses 6-7. Either they stand alone as they are found in KJV-only literature as a promise of God to preserve his words forever, like this:

v6: God's word can be trusted, and
v7: God will preserve his words for us

or they are logically integrated into the rest of the psalm, like this:

v5: Because God says he will set the poor and needy in safety, and
v6: Because God's word can be trusted, therefore
v7: We can trust that God will preserve the poor and needy.

If the first interpretation is correct, then v6 and v7 form a complete unit, unrelated to the rest of the psalm. They stand as in island dedicated to the integrity of scripture rising above the waves of unjust societal oppression. Or if we are to argue that somehow v6 and v7 belong with the rest of the psalm, we end up arguing that God answered David's prayer for help from oppression by promising to produce a perfect bible in the 17th Century for English-speakers. I'm sure that would make David feel better, but it does leave his immediate problem rather unresolved***. God seems to have just dropped two verses about scripture into David's petition for relief.

If this second interpretation is the correct one, then Psalm 12 has absolutely nothing to say about modern Bible versions and especially the KJV.

I believe the second to make a far better case, based not only on the verse 5-6-7 logical pattern but because in this reading v7 provides the solution for the the problem outlined in v1. Only in the second case is the psalm a single problem/solution literary unit with all verses belonging in that context. The "them" is ambiguous, to be sure, but I see absolutely no reason to interpret it in such a way as to remove vv6&7 from the rest of the psalm.

But if the second is the correct interpretation, then one who uses these verses to support a KJV-only position is doing violence to the very word of God he is ripping churches apart to defend. Which is not as ironic as it might seem at first glance.

* I probably haven't mentioned recently how much I hate verse divisions. The original scriptural writings did not contain them, of course - they are a product of the 12th Century - which is why when I reproduce scripture here I usually take them out. Yes, they are fine if one needs to find a specific verse or to cut a passage into manageable chunks as I have done above. Too often, however, they produce a cookie-cutter bible, a Confucian-like handbook of clever little slogans, universalized and divorced from context, that are more misleading than helpful.

** we're skipping “To the chief Musician upon Sheminith, A Psalm of David,” which is not part of the psalm proper, but tells the author and the note upon which it is to begin. Sheminith is, according to Easton's Bible Dictionary, “a musical term, supposed to denote the lowest note sung by men’s voices."

*** the result a lack of respect for context usually produces.

Bible silliness

Beautiful Self perpetuates a modern mythology:

I believe the King James Bible is the preserved and infallible words of God. It doesn't merely "contain" the word of God: it IS the word of God. I'm absolutely sure of it, and I'd like to give a few reasons why. Here are twelve reasons how I know that the KJV is the word of God:

What follows is a list of a dozen arguments for why the KJV, and most importantly the KJV alone, is the word of God. A few of them apply to all bibles, a few of them are silly, and a few of them are just plain incorrect. I shan't deal with all of them*, but would like to put the first few of them on trial just to see if what the proponents of using only the KJV** propose for reasons stand up to scrutiny.

Reason #1: God Promised to Preserve His Words

These words [Psalm 12:6-7 et al] state very clearly that God's preserved word MUST be available to us today, because God PROMISED to preserve it for us. There MUST be an infallible Book somewhere.

You say, "But ALL translations are God's word, not just one." That's impossible, because the various translations contain different readings ...According to the scriptures, there must be a single Book that is the word of God...

The first might be the silliest; it's certainly the most self-refuting. Ignoring just for the moment the probability that "them" in 12:7 applies to the "poor" and "needy" in v5 rather than the "words" in v6, and accepting the idea that God preserving his words means that there must be "a single book that is the word of God" at all times, what was the Word of God in 1610, the year before the KJV was finished? Was no word of God available? There is certainly no bible before the KJV that is exactly a KJV***. Maybe something else was the word of God and then got booted when the KJV was done.

Rather, the KJV translators (who would find the whole KJV-only debate a little silly) had the right idea, which they wrote right into the KJV's preface: "we affirm and avow, that the very meanest translation of the Bible in English, set forth by men of our profession... containeth the word of God, nay, is the word of God." This sounds very much like the original paragraph above. I suppose, though, that maybe the guys who translated the KJV just didn't know what they were talking about.

Reason #2: The Authorized Version Was Translated Under A God-Ordained English King

I was wrong, #2 is sillier:

Unlike the modern versions, the KJV was translated under a king... The new versions have been translated in America, which is not a monarchy. God's form of government is a theocratic monarchy, not a democracy. Therefore, it makes perfect sense that His word would be translated for the English speaking people under a monarchy**** with an English king.

If God's form of government for us is a monarchy, theocratic or otherwise, someone might have forgotten to tell God, for when the people of Israel asked Samuel to give them a king, God told him:

"Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them." -- 1Sam 8:7

The existence of an earthly king, if it has any bearing at all*****, constitutes a rejection of God's reign over the people. It's right there in the KJV.

Reason #3: Because It Has No Copyright

The original crown copyright of 1611 does not forbid anyone today from reprinting the Authorized Version...

The KJV is one of a small number of works for which the Crown copyright is perpetual and UK publishers still need a patent letter from the crown to print KJVs. Reason #3 is flat-out incorrect.

But modern bibles produced in the US that are more than 70 years old have no copyright - or rather, it has expired. Do they become the word of God on their 70th birthday?

Reason #4: Because God Always Translates Perfectly

The words "translate" and "translated" occur three times in the Bible, and GOD is the Translator each time. The scholars insist that the KJV cannot be infallible, because it is "only a translation." Do you suppose that such scholars have checked II Samuel 3:10, Colossians 1:13, and Hebrews 11:5 to see what GOD has to say about translating?

The changing of the meaning of translate from "to bear, carry, or move from one place, position, etc., to another; transfer." as in those verses to "to turn from one language into another" is a textbook example of the Fallacy of Equivocation.

You get the idea. Rather than an exercise in critical thought and biblical exposition, I rather suspect the above is better described as an illustration of how people can convince themselves of anything, given sufficient emotional motivation. It is unfortunate that any number of churches have been torn apart over such sloppy thinking, as it appears this young lady's is presently.

* You'll get the idea quickly enough.

** I'll admit up front that I don't use the KJV and haven't for years. I mostly use the RVA (en español) and when I have to work in English I use the NASB. Nor do I have any opinion about what bible others should read. Some are better, some worse, just the kind of thing KJV-only folks hate to hear. I'll use the KJV for this, though, just for fun.

*** Or why have a KJV?

**** Notice how "theocratic" got slipped out there. Though I suppose one could argue that James' monarchy was a theocratic one, just like that of his just-as-God-ordained Catholic sister, Bloody Mary.

***** which I doubt

Not all that much of a surprise, really

when you think about it:

The Obama administration task force is likely to recommend more aid for struggling U.S. automakers, a senior senator said on Wednesday.

Carl Levin of Michigan said on Capitol Hill that "it is clear" more help is on the way and any assistance for General Motors and Chrysler LLC would be tied to new conditions on restructuring.

So long as there's money to be borrowed or created, "it is clear" that Obama's going to keep dumping it on Detroit. But it does make me wonder, since this new money* would be tied to new conditions on restructuring, and the companies are currently in the process of restructuring in order to get the prior money that they already lost, does that mean they have to restructure again? Counting on early-to-mid June for a third $20b or so "rescue" package, they may have to have as many as three restructurings going on at the same time. One wonders where they will find time to make cars**.

UPDATE: the Post Office is also running out of cash. Not that this is a surprise***. But there was one extremely funny line:

William Young, president of the National Association of Letter Carriers, stressed in his testimony that the agency is not seeking a taxpayer bailout, "but we are here to ask the Congress for help."

As long as you don't call it a bailout, you don't have to ask for one.

* an additional $22 billion, to go on top of the prior $18b.

** Then again, if they cease to create anything at all, it might just be easier to make them part of the Department of Agriculture or something.

*** Congress constantly blocks even the most reasonable cost-cutting measures, like closing rural offices. The post office can no more thrive long-term than can Fannie, and for the same reason.

Another day, another trillion dollars

You know your plan is stupid when even economists won't buy it:

Even the best and brightest brains in economics the Nobel laureates aren't unanimous on whether the Treasury's plan to rid banks of toxic assets will rescue the economy.

Debate arose yesterday among the more than 50 living winners of the acclaimed prize, with a lopsided ratio of 9-to-1 giving Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner's plan a public thumbs-down...

But economist Michael Spence, a co-winner of the 2001 Nobel, came out in support of Geithner, saying his plan "could work."

"Could work" has got to be the ringingest endorsement I've ever heard. Now, if one remembers correctly*, this is pretty much the same plan that Paulson and Bernanke swerved the Congress with last September - buy up the crappy burritos so banks will have enough free capital to make more.

Yes, it might work. It just might get all that crappy stuff off the banks' books. It might just get credit "flowing" again, so we can start lending to all the people who do not already have too much debt to manage, so housing will become expensive rather than affordable, and so mortgage brokers can resume issuing government-guaranteed jumbo loans to strawberry pickers on no-down-payment ARMs.

It never seems to occur to Gaithner that his plan "working" might not be a very good idea in the first place.

* as Treasury officials and congressmen do not.

Good Hater - Introduction Redux

So anyway, I turned in the first draft of my George Hoyt paper (now named Good Hater) just before spring break, and even though Professor Roberts will hand it back with corrections, I really don't foresee it having that many. That being the case, the good news is that I'll start posting it here in chunks over the next few weeks. The bad news is that I've re-worked the intro a bit, but not enough that it won't seem familiar to those of you who read the first pass. I do need to re-post it, however, as I've introduced a few themes that will play out later in the narrative:

Lawrence was burning the morning of August 21, 1863. The clatter of hooves drowned out the weeping of that Kansas town's newest widows as William Quantrill's victorious guerrillas galloped away, quickly leaving the dust raised by approaching troops behind. Cut off from an eastward flight by state militiamen and independent companies of scouts, they traveled south, burning a mile-wide swath between Baldwin City and Paola as a parting gift to the people of Kansas. Their pursuers now to the north and west of them, the band then turned back toward the northeast to exit the state precisely where they had entered it forty-eight hours earlier. The bloodiest raid of the decade-old Kansas-Missouri border war had gone off with nary a hitch.

As they approached the safety of the Missouri border, the horsemen broke into smaller groups, some to return to home and farm, some because tired mounts, ridden too hard for too long, could not keep up with the main body. A few of the men were simply too exhausted, or too drunk, to hold their formation. One such group of three men, captured by Missouri militiamen as they crossed the state line, found themselves dragged before a mounted cavalry officer who had just arrived in pursuit. Though a captain's stripes adorned his Union uniform, even atop his horse everything about him seemed undersized. The mixture of anger and hatred that radiated from his expression was almost comically offset by his boyish features. The captured guerrillas might have written him off as a mere lad playing soldier but for the leggings of red leather that reached from his knees halfway down his riding boots.

The officer ordered one of the guerrillas to disgorge the loot from his pockets; it consisted mainly of children's toys and cheap buttons, with a mouth organ and some shoe laces mixed in. Looking over the pathetic take, the astonished captain drew one of a pair of ivory-handled pistols that hung from an embossed morocco belt about his slender waist. “I'll kill you just for being a damned fool ,” he said. The first shot was quickly followed by two more, and three bodies were kicked into the brush. George Hoyt, Captain of the Kansas Red Legs, put his sidearm away. This is what he had come to Kansas to do.

The rest will be in about 5 pieces: John Brown's Trial, The Kansas Seventh Cavalry, The Red Legs, The Kansas Fifteenth Cavalry, and a summary. It will be sans footnotes, so you'll just have to trust me that every statement is backed by properly-accredited historical authorities*. Fair 'nuff?

* Actually, they are not, and I have considered adding expanded notes and explanations for the two places where I went a bit off the historical reservation. The first is my assertion that Hoyt killed guerrilla captain George Todd, for which I have 2 sources, ignored** by nearly all later historians. The second is more speculative, namely that John Brown accepted Hoyt as his lawyer sight unseen because Brown had a friend named David Starr Hoyt*** who was killed by border ruffians. That one is a bit of a stretch, but I hope that I have made the case. We shall see when I get the corrections back in the next 2 weeks.

** or perhaps not found, which I hope to be the case. What good is a research paper if you don't bring anything unique to light?

*** a fourth-cousin of George. That may seem too far for comfort, but they were both abolitionists from Massachusetts and George later wrote a biography of David, so there is some linkage.

For Huck

What I learned on my vacation to Yucatan

The Mayan Templo de los Siete Muñecos is cool, but less than maximum potential coolness when you get there after sunrise two days before the equinox.

When your Mexican guide jokes about the "chicken tacos" really being iguana tacos, he's probably not joking.

While I salute Huck for blogging from Hawaii, there was no way I was going to pay .70 a minute to blog via satellite from the middle of the Gulf of Mexico. Besides, I only watched the news once, it was in Spanish, and I still don't know what Obama said nor the actress that died.

Black people really do have more rhythm than white people. There is a reason for the stereotype. And it's not just American white people.

There is no point in getting off the boat in Cozumel.

Any American who pays $75 for a "Segway Adventure" on the beach needs to be left behind as a matter of principle.

I could listen to a gray-headed Jamaican bartender all day, mon.

If you bring homework, you will do it, but it will not seem a chore.

Cuban cigars fit very well in the slide of a trombone.

Never try to throw books away on a cruise ship. On Tuesday I finished "War to the Knife," which had a broken spine when I received it via Amazon. I brought it on the cruise fully intending to throw it away, and I did, in my room. The cleaning guy took it out of the trash. On Wednesday, I threw it away again, and the cleaning guy took it out of the trash again. So on Thursday, I put it in a bag with a bunch of trash paper and threw it in the trash. The cleaning guy took it out of the trash a third time. So on Friday, I took it five floors up to one of the dining rooms, still in the bag, and threw it in the trash there. But I quickly discovered what looked like the trash was only a bin for napkins. No worries, maybe they'll get the hint and dispose of it. This morning at breakfast, Rogue sees the book sitting out on one of the tables. Apparently they pulled it out of the not-trash thinking someone threw it away by mistake. Next time, any book I no longer want I'll just leave in the ship's library, where it is guaranteed to never be read again.

There's no place like home. (hat tip: Mitzibel)

Oh, it's true

See ya in a week...

The amazing disappearing weapons

JR Nyquist fails to account for a few:

A former KGB officer, Panarin made a splash by predicting that America will probably come under martial law by the end of 2009, and may fracture into several states by 2011...

If this should happen, foreign powers would intervene and the country would be split along geographical lines: California and the West would fall under Chinese control, Texas and the south would go to Mexico, and Russia would lay claim to Alaska...

Without the United States in the picture, Russia and China would be the dominant powers. They would dictate terms to the world. No country or group of countries could possibly stand against them. This is because Russia and China possess thousands of nuclear weapons...

Since I first read Joel Garreau's 1981 book, The Nine Nations of North America, I've been fascinated with its premise: North America may be three nations politically, but it is really at least nine economically and culturally. There's French-speaking Quebec in the north, Spanish-speaking MexAmerica al sur, tree-hugging Ecotopia on the West Coast. It does not take a genius to posit* that if America ever did break up, it would likely be along those lines.

That said, there seem to be a few things missing from the analyses of both Mr. Panarin and Mr. Nyquist. The easy ones are, well, easy: if China cannot control Taiwan, and if China cannot move millions of men quickly by ship, it has less chance of controlling California than does Costa Rica. In fact, the problems that would lead America to this manner of breakup flash double for China: they have dozens of ethnic groups and languages, none of whom would have anything constructive to do if their major customer disappeared. They share borders with nuclear Russia and India, and Japan is still in their way. Perhaps China can control North Korea. California is out of the question.

The same story in the south. Texas would hardly "go to Mexico." If Mexico lasts as a single nation for the next decade I'll be surprised. In fact, if Mexico was smart, they'd try to figure out a way to get Texas to conquer them. Any proposed North American Union is not Canada and Mexico taking over the US.

The analysis also fails to account for four smaller issues that I shan't expound upon: Russia's horrible demographics, its less-than-half-the-US population, Russia and China's underdeveloped economies, and whether Russia and China could get along if the US was not around. I'll just say I seem to remember there was a time when the USSR and the US were allies, and no one could stand against them...

But the idea that Russia could control Alaska - plausible on the surface because Russia could conceivably march troops across the Bering Strait - requires even more fanciful thinking. Russia and China, we are told, would dictate terms to the world because they possess thousands of nuclear weapons. I for one would opine that if Alaska ever broke from the US, it would immediately become the third nuclear power in North America. Texas might be the fourth. Even tiny Hawaii** might be able to offer some jet-fuel powered deterrent. Even after a breakup, some power called The United States - even if it was only made up of 20-some disunited ones - would be a nuclear power as well. If the United States ceased to exist, our nuclear arsenal would not, just like the USSR's did not when they became Russia and Ukraine and the Baltics and a whole handful of -istans. Russia quickly got control of the nukes, and foreign powers have wisely not tried to take over the parts spun off by the centrifugal collapse of communism*** for that reason.

The collapse of the US would leave a handful of angry, hungry nuclear powers on this continent. Perhaps we would nuke each other before anyone else tried to get involved, in which case, the Russians would be welcome to the smoldering ruins. But until that happens, any thoughts that the Russians and the Chinese might be able to expand their real estate markets in the wake of an American collapse have about 10,000 uranium-based arguments against them.

* Well, it does not take one to understand it, because I did.

** Though it's not really in North America.

*** We have unwisely tried to do so after a fashion, an effort that probably died last year when Russian tanks rolled into Georgia. Territory is held by boots on the ground.

Who you calling "we," Kimosabe?

Obama lies about lying to us:

WASHINGTON (AP) - Confronting misgivings, even in his own party, President Barack Obama mounted a stout defense of his blueprint to overhaul the economy Thursday, declaring the national crisis is "not as bad as we think" and his plans will speed recovery...

"I don't think things are ever as good as they* say, or ever as bad as they say," Obama added. "Things two years ago were not as good as we thought because there were a lot of underlying weaknesses in the economy. They're not as bad as we think they are now."

I've often wondered about people who are able to balance simultaneous, contradictory positions. Is he saying that he thinks things are not as bad as he thinks they are? Or is he absolutely certain that what he thinks is wrong?

I'm curious, because it was just a few weeks ago that Obama was telling us that the seas would boil and the skies would fall if Congress did not allocate $800b to be spent over the next 2 years, in addition to the $400b Congress spent last week. It was so bad we had to quadruple the largest budget deficit in our nation's history, we had to ramp up the size of government at twice the prodigious rate of that other guy who used to be president but whose name I've forgotten. Now it's, "Never mind, and no, you can't have the money back."

Now, if I were a cynical person, I would probably reach the conclusion that negative economic assessments are created and used by executives who wish to get legislators to spend money they** will later regret, and that optimistic ones are used to move poll numbers.

Instead I'm just going to opine that since neither politicians nor mainstream economists saw the problem coming, nor have they shown any evidence of having accurately assessed it once it arrived, Obama is simply in no position to say that things are not as bad as he thinks they are. But I'm sure that his ignorance combined with our checkbook can surely make them worse.

* by "they," of course, he means "I."

** by "they," of course, I mean "we."

Today is big round number day

Eleven trillion dollars is about $1800 for every man, woman, and child on the planet. So come on all you greedy foreigners. Pay up.

Not winning and never will

See if you can find today's meme:

Obama says U.S. not winning Afghanistan War

Biden says West "not winning" in Afghanistan

McCain: 'We Are Not Winning' War in Afghanistan

US general says troops "not winning" in Afghanistan

So we started the war in Afghanistan in what? 2002? If we have not won by now, we have lost, and it's time to come home. It is a simple reality of history and of politics, and not unlike our own history, though sometimes we lose valuable insight by trying to make a morality play out of everything.

In 1776, the American population was not at all unanimous on breaking away from Britain. It was not even a majority view, though it was a large plurality. The rest of the people were either doggedly anti-independence (maybe 1 in 5) or completely apolitical. That was at the beginning, and if there was ever a chance to "settle" the Americans it was while the majority of them either supported Britain or didn't care.

However, as the war dragged on, as it affected more and more people in more and more ways, and as it became harder to stay out, more people chose sides, and once they chose, that was permanent. From the time a solid majority of armed, male Americans wanted independence, it did not matter what the British did short of killing them all, which was out of their power. Britain was going to lose America, and if not in 1776 or 81, then in 1812 or whenever they turned their heads to look at something else. Because the outcome was not in doubt, the faster they lost, the better for them in the long run.

Americans in 2009 are the Brits of 1781. We have years of war behind us. We have years of people choosing sides, of dead relatives, of passions whipped up by partisans. We have a generation of boys grown up whose sole purpose in life is to kill the Americans. The sides are drawn up, and there are no more hearts and minds to be won. Short of oppressing and driving millions from the country, we can no longer win in Afghanistan.

So why don't politicians see it that way? Because it's not a matter of history. Afghanistan to them is a puzzle, a challenge, a chance to show how clever they are and what great leaders they are. They truly believe that victory there is a matter of strategy rather than a matter of several million men with guns who do not want you. A few more tweaks to our strategy will convince them that they were wrong to fight us.

"When you aren't winning in this kind of war," McCain says, "you are losing." I would say that if after billions of dollars and eight years, if you have not already won, you have already lost.

Inspired by the heartbreaking true story of poor people who can barely make it until midnight on the first of the month, when they can finally go to One Stop Food & Liquors to buy single-serving, pre-cooked meals for the children.

UPDATE: Feralis notes That's a luxury item, right there.

That was what kind of caught my eye. You can't complain* that your food dollar does not go very far in the frozen, pre-cooked, single-serving pot pie section. No one's food dollar goes far there.

Imagine, if you will, a line from left to right. The left end represents maximum frugality (growing your own apples and grinding your own flour) while the right end represents maximum convenience (drive-thrus, delivery, breakfast in bed).

Frozen, single-serving pot pies are a lot closer to the right than the left, more convenient than frugal - they are more expensive than regular food for that very reason. If you can't buy enough chicken pot pies with other people's money, then you simply need to keep moving left down the line until you find something you can afford, even if (gasp) you have to cook it yourself. That's what all the rest of America is going to be doing, too.

You might try this (hat tip: JD) for starters.

* Of course you can. I just won't care.

Leave God out of it

This is why pastors should not aspire to be prophets:

"An earth-shattering calamity is about to happen," [David Wilkerson] writes. "It is going to be so frightening, we are all going to tremble – even the godliest among us."

Wilkerson's vision is of fires raging through New York City.

"It will engulf the whole megaplex, including areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. Major cities all across America will experience riots and blazing fires – such as we saw in Watts, Los Angeles, years ago," he explains. "There will be riots and fires in cities worldwide. There will be looting – including Times Square, New York City. What we are experiencing now is not a recession, not even a depression. We are under God’s wrath.

I've actually read a couple of David Wilkerson's books*, most recently "America's Last Call," which I reviewed a few years ago - unfortunately, it fell in the 2003-5 period when this blog was at another host, and is therefore lost for eternity. Written during the Asian financial crisis of the late 90s, "America's Last Call" makes a number of false economic forecasts**, as it basically extrapolates that crisis to America and states that the US will "imminently" face a similar crisis. Obviously, it didn't happen. None of the specifics happened. America went on into the fattest decade and more we have ever had***. If I recall - and it has been a few years since I read it - Wilkerson suffered the same problems in a book called "The Vision."

"So what?" you rightly ask. "El B is wrong about stuff all the time." I am. I'm probably wrong about most things, and I fully expect that when all is revealed I will be shown to have known less about fewer things than I could have ever imagined.

But I'm not speaking for God.

You see, when a person claims to have a vision from God, and when the things they say don't come to pass, they do not get the kind of breaks that El B gets for being human. They don't get do-overs. God does not make stock market predictions or lay odds or say "maybe even in the next few years." The fact that "America's Last Call" was filled with statistics and interviews makes me believe it less to be an actual vision than a hysterical reaction to CNBC. Malachi and friends did not carry stock charts with them: they spoke for God, or not, and you took their words alone, or not.

My memory may be faulty, and everything Wilkerson has written, all his visions put to paper, may have all come to pass. Or he may have been early. Because I don't have the books in front of me, I am not calling him a false prophet, though if I recall, I did when I reviewed "America's Last Call." This is not really even about Wilkerson.

What it is about is whether God even needs to warn us that what we are doing will bring economic calamity. I don't think he does. Because economic calamity is the natural and unavoidable result of creating millions of dollars from nothing, of spending more than we make, of borrowing trillions and trillions from the future. Disaster is written into those actions because justice is written into the universe.

It does not take God to bring economic calamity upon us. We are perfectly capable of doing that ourselves.

UPDATE: Is Karl Denninger also among the prophets?

Civil unrest will break out before the end of the year. The Military and Guard will be called up to try to stop it. They won't be able to. Big cities are at risk of becoming a free-fire death zone. If you live in one, figure out how you can get out and live somewhere else if you detect signs that yours is starting to go "feral"...

Bleak reading (too bleak, imo). But it's amazing how close his specifics are to Wilkerson's...

* though never The Cross and the Switchblade, the one that made him famous.

** If anyone seriously wants the specifics, I'll be happy to re-read the book. Yes, I still have it - I keep all my old econ books.

*** That those things may be - are - happening now does not help his case, I'm afraid.

In case of Fire

How can a rat flee the ship

if it never gets on board in the first place?

LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Dr. Sanjay Gupta, CNN's chief medical correspondent, has withdrawn his name from consideration as surgeon general of the United States, he said Thursday.

But wait, while you're wondering how we as a nation can recover from such disappointment*, there's more:

WASHINGTON -- Two candidates for top jobs at the Treasury have withdrawn their names from consideration, complicating efforts by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner to staff his department at a time of economic crisis, according to people familiar with the matter.

It sort of reminds me of von Mises' Depression-era response when someone asked him what he would do if suddenly put in charge of the Fed. "I would resign," he said. He was a smart guy**.

But Obama's people are so smart that they resign even before they get the jobs they are resigning from.

* though it does make me wonder, what, exactly, does the nation need a surgeon general for? And if the guy who would have the job is already on TV, why change anything?

** You've heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates? Morons.

Beauty is only skin deep

It's quiet in here...*

Just when you thought all those clever engineers should be making quieter cars, along comes Kansas with a committee to beep that idea out of your head:

Such committee shall research, identify and make recommendations to the department of transportation concerning strategies to ensure that all motor vehicles, regardless of engine type or configuration, emit sound sufficient to be heard and localized by pedestrians, including those who are blind or visually impaired.

Yes, it is what it sounds like. Someone in the legislature is concerned that cars, especially electric and hybrid ones, will be so quiet that blind people won't be able to hear them. So SB 295 seeks to mandate that they constantly, everywhere, and "without motorist activation" make as much noise as a delivery truck backing up, just in case there is a blind person nearby that the driver doesn't see.

So I guess that's one way to make sure there are no hybrids in Kansas. Or no sleep.

* Go ahead, push the Kill Me button. I dare you.

(Hat tip: TerryMum)

Hey, it could happen

Wussy Jesus

Robert V. Thompson finds one:

[T]he Jesus I know wouldn’t cast a stone much less shoot a gun...

Jesus would not pack a pistol. Just as he threw the moneychangers out of the temple he would throw gun bearers out of the sanctuary. He would tell them to come back but only if they were unarmed...

Here is my bottom line. Jesus would not join the NRA, because he never condoned any form of violence.

It would be interesting to discover how Jesus would throw armed people out of church without a) violence or b) a gun, but for an answer it might be instructive to review how he threw the aforementioned moneychangers out of the temple the first time:

Jesus went up to Jerusalem, and to the temple, during Passover. Inside he found moneychangers sitting, along with those who sold oxen and sheep. And when he had made a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen, and poured out the changers' money and overturned their tables...
-- John 2:13-15

That looks just a tad violent to me*. Now I suppose Jesus could have reasoned with those fine, upstanding businessmen. Surely they would have respected his oratory and agreed to peacefully move their market a few yards outside to the court. Instead he made a weapon and whipped their butts with it, then he dumped their stuff all over the floor.

Leaving aside the fact that a "sanctuary" does not exist in Christianity**, I don't see how the same Jesus who made an offensive weapon and drove people out of the temple with it would have any argument with those who would carry weapons for defensive purposes in any other kind of building. Then again, maybe the creator of the universe just doesn't understand guns like we moderns do.

* What a disappointment Jesus must be to the peaceful religious liberals of this world.

** We have buildings in which we meet, but God does not dwell there like he dwelt among the Jews. They are just buildings. We even have toy gunfights in them sometimes.

Is it all wet in here, or is it just me?

Quite a bit of heat over in The Fire Swamp in response to the post on the guy who wants to stimulate St. Louis by getting everyone to buy lottery tickets. In fact it was, in the words of one poster, "a circle jerk of negative proportions." But the funny part is that I don't think it was all that negative, especially when compared to legendary* investor Jim Rogers, who says, bluntly, "What you should do is become a farmer, or start a farming network." It should be noted that he practices what he preaches.

But Rogers does make me think of an analogy regarding debt and stimulus, as does this article on why right now we should be focusing on balance sheet issues presently rather than growth: if the economy is like an engine**, that doesn't mean that the solution is always to give it more gas. If it stalls because it's flooded, then there is nothing to do but let it drain itself. It doesn't particularly matter to the engine how important it is to you that it start now*** or how late you are for work, nor does it take into consideration the feelings of the spouse impatiently waiting for you. Pressing the gas will only make it worse.

It may be considered bit negative to tell the guy frantically tromping the pedal that he's only making it worse or at least not helping. But I don't really think it is. Sometimes there's one and only one way to get the engine re-started, and the longer you tromp on the gas, the longer you'll sit in the dark.

* as opposed to "mythical," I suppose.

** "engine of growth" is a favorite cliche of the financial press.

*** "We can't wait" and "we have to do something" are favorite refrains, but they reflect the importance of our situation, not the reality of the engine.

Obama Wants You

In the words of the inimitable JD:

I am relieved today - relieved that a governor from a backward hinterland state who appears in fashion magazines and shoots turkeys in controlled conditions can serve at the highest levels of government.

After the last election cycle, I was starting to get worried.

I wonder how long it will take before the press begins calling the inevitable hateful* gridlock between our new governor - a former head of the GOP who left the party to run as Governor Gilligan's lieutenant - and our overwhelmingly GOP legislature, "Mark Parkinson's Disease"?

* immensely entertaining.

Weekend randomness

I have finished the first draft of "A Notorious Red Leg," and shipped it off to my parents, to mom to see how I incorporated the genealogy research she did for me*, and to Dad to check for any obvious errors in my treatment of Quantrill's men***. It will weigh in at a svelte 35 pages or so once I incorporate pictures and the like.

There is a bingo-like board floating around the web of the things to look for at Wal*Mart. Two things I have not seen on it but did see at Wal*Mart this morning are a truck with three Bob Saget heads stenciled on the tailgate, and a guy with a hook for a left hand.

Both Citi and AIG received another round**** of government assistance since Friday, a situation that resulted in the funniest line I read all weekend:

AIG was first rescued in September after bad mortgage bets left it on the verge of collapse.

You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.

* and for which I thank her**. Thanks, mom.

** how many 40-something-year-old guys have a mom who will still help them with their homework?

*** He's a non-professional expert on the American west, the kind of guy I love to have check my work. He even discovered another (the fourth between the two of us) account of George Todd's death yesterday, a subject over which we have gone several rounds. This one attributed it to "a Kansas sniper," otherwise unnamed. I know who that is.

**** Everyone here who thinks that the third-best idea will be the one that solves the problem, open your wallet raise your hand.