The Clinton Question in Action

A couple posts down, I mentioned my “Hillary Clinton Question” for supporting or opposing executive action–”Would I support this executive action if my political opposite [Hillary Clinton] were in office?.” John Cole brought it back to my mind in his response to the Obama administration’s efforts to get more access to a person’s internet activity without a warrant. They want to add “electronic communication transactional records” to the list of items the FBI may demand without a judge’s approval. This includes “the addresses to which an Internet user sends e-mail; the times and dates e-mail was sent and received; and possibly a user’s browser history,” but apparently not the content of the e-mail itself (or so they say). Appropriately upset by the possible implications of this on privacy rights, Cole writes:

People seem to forget that a lot of the crap in the Patriot Act originally was proposed by the Clinton administration, and Republicans back then were wary of letting Democrats have that kind of power (a lot of it was also that they were just like today’s GOP and just opposed anything Clinton suggested). 9/11 changed all that. Now that both parties are essentially weak-kneed pansies who faint if someone so much as whispers the word “terrorism” anywhere near them, it is impossible to think of a situation in which any administration, Republican or Democratic, can not just say national security and get whatever they want. And, as we’ve learned, even if they don’t get what they want, they’ll do it anyway, and the next administration will just “look forward, not backwards.” Unless you’re a whistleblower.

Back to the substance of the issue- wtf is so hard about getting a damned warrant?

Heh. Limited government, except when our team is in power or when it comes to the chief executive and the war on terror.

Links of interest

Finally, something at least somewhat worthwhile from Twitter. Researchers at Northeastern University and Harvard University are using tweets to determine the overall mood of people in geographical areas over the course of a day.

“IPcalypse soon.” In less than a year, the Internet will run out of IP addresses. Not to worry, though. A new IP scheme is being implemented which will make room for a mind-boggling 50 thousand trillion trillion addresses per human being currently alive.

Sarah Palin Needs to Read ITA

Newt Gingrich too apparently, as they’re both now opposing the construction of a “Ground Zero Mosque” a couple blocks away from Ground Zero. They should read Karl Born’s nice ITA article on the subject. Apparently freedom of worship, private property rights, and federalism (the local planning board approved construction overwhelmingly) are no longer conservative values. Neither apparently is making the distinction between average freedom-loving American Muslims and an Afghanistan-based terror organization. At least New York is “Real America” again now, which this lifelong East Coaster appreciates. Hopefully that will last beyond the next election when the liberal-er candidate wins.

Meanwhile, Conor Friedersdorf asks, won’t someone please think of the Ground Zero Strip Clubs? Heh.

Total Depravity and being Left Behind

The latest entry in Slacktivist Fred Clark’s long-running (over six years now) series deconstructing the Left Behind series for its crimes against literature and theology took an interesting rabbit trail this week, as Clark posted a brief dissertation on the Reformed doctrine of Total Depravity. Total Depravity states (quoting from Wikipedia) “that people are by nature not inclined or even able to love God wholly with heart, mind, and strength, but rather all are inclined by nature to serve their own will and desires and to reject the rule of God.” It is of course the first of the five points of Calvinism, though can one find some agreement in Lutheranism and other Christians influenced by Augustinian thought.

In his essay, Clark takes Total Depravity to mean encompassing all aspects of the human being—spirit, conscience, reason, will, physicality—and says this is what Calvin actually argued. He contrasts this definition with how many Christians use the term today, which he says is better defined as utter depravity, meaning absolutely base, vile, rotten to the core. While attacking Left Behind for constantly “telling and not showing” a world gone mad because Christians and children have been raptured from it (a regular Slacktivist refrain: LB is “not scary enough”), he attacks utter depravity as neo-Platonism and ignorant of the divine spark in beings created in God’s image. Going further, he argues utter depravity makes for rather undemocratic politics, as humanity cannot be trusted with the pursuit of justice or rational self-governance. The answer is totalitarianism or lawlessness.

A committed Calvinist would say Clark flirts with semi-pelagianism in this interpretation. Still, I thought it was worth a read, as is much of the work in Clark’s Left Behind series. Six years in and only the first movie and a book-and-a-half done. Maybe he’s banking on a thousand-year reign after all…

The image of a man you do not see

I would like to draw your attention to this extraordinary and compelling musing by Roger Ebert on architecture, beauty and community values. A portion:

Sullivan famously said, “form follows function.” Mies famously said, “less is more.” Are these two ways of saying the same thing? I think not. Sullivan also said, “The building’s identity resides in its ornament.” His great buildings, his early skyscrapers, were vast and strong, but they had ornate entrances, stunning lobbies, cornices, canopies, deceptions, elaborate decorations, breaks in the monotony of the facade. Most of Mies’ work was as sparing as it could possibly be: Rigid rectangles broken into smaller rectangles as if drawn with a straight edge pressed to the page. Look at IBM Plaza in Chicago and you will see a building with no ornament at all. The man behind a Sullivan building seems humane and humorous, a bringer of gifts to the observer. The man behind a Mies building seems more like a machine and a miser, never relinquishing a single detail not absolutely necessary. Sullivan allows whimsy. Mies slaps its hand with a ruler.

Be sure also to follow the links in pictures or check them out here. Glorious stuff, really.

And since we’re thinking about architecture and its ability to reflect community values, you really should also read John Ruskin’s On the Nature of Gothic Architecture.

The Foundation

Yesterday was the 30th anniversary of Ronald Reagan’s acceptance speech at the 1980 Republican Convention. The “A New Beginning” speech marked the beginning of the Reagan era and the end of the era of malaise. As Tom Schaller notes, many of the themes evident in the 1980 speech are still repeated by Republican politicians today. Recall the presidential aspirants in 2008 tripping over themselves to show how Reaganite they were.

The current GOP is almost as directionless as the post-Watergate one was. Reagan gave it direction. How much of his legacy is still relevant? The Gipper is now closer in history to JFK than to Obama. Is it time for another New Beginning?

Lutherans in Convention

The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod is holding its triennial convention this week in Houston, Texas. Since we have a couple Lutheran writers on this blog, and some Lutheran readers too, I thought it would be worth looking at what’s going on. I’m following the events via the ALPB Forum, but you can also go to the official convention site for the video feed (zzzzz), press releases, photographs, and so on.

The big news so far is the surprisingly convincing (54 percent to 45 percent) defeat of two-term incumbent Rev. Dr. Gerald Kieschnick at the hands of Rev. Matthew Harrison, current executive director of LCMS World Relief, a missionary and relief organization. Rarely in LCMS history has an incumbent synod president been defeated in convention, though the “moderate” Kieschnick lost to the “conservative” Harrison 643-527. I put the political terms in quotes because they’re both pretty conservative in theology as far as world Christianity goes (it is the LCMS after all), but that’s how they line up within the denomination (think a Texas primary between Kay Hutchison and Rick Perry). LCMS World Relief is one of the denomination’s better organizations, so Harrison figures to be a good choice. He’d previously also served as a pastor in Iowa and Fort Wayne, Indiana. Ironically, the convention also passed much of the restructuring and consolidation of power that outgoing president Kieschnick wanted. Ooops.

(In secular politics this happens all the time. Make consolidating power in the chief executive a conservative issue, and then the people elect Barack Obama. This mistake is avoided with what I’ve always called “The Hillary Clinton Question.” It’s one of the more conservative questions a person can him or herself: “Would I support this executive action if my political opposite [Hillary Clinton] were in office?” If no, then don’t do it. This question works surprisingly well…)

The LCMS in convention also responded to the ELCA’s actions last summer where they announced support for “publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same-gender relationships” as morally acceptable and authorized the ordination of homosexuals in committed relationships. (See the related links below for ITA’s coverage of that event). Compared to the ELCA, the LCMS was quite united on the issue and very much opposed. The delegates adopted two resolutions overwhelmingly (1133-35 and 1093-61) affirming the the belief that “the practice of homosexuality—in any and all situations… must be recognized as sin,” but committing themselves “to approach those with homosexual inclinations with the deepest possible Christian love and pastoral concern, in whatever situation they may be living.” Here is the full press release.

Flash Brindisi

As seen on a friend’s Facebook:

On Saturday, April 24th, the Opera Company of Philadelphia teamed up with the Reading Terminal Market Italian Festival for a large-scale “Flash Opera” event! Over 30 members of the Opera Company of Philadelphia Chorus and principal cast members of LA TRAVIATA performed the famed “Brindisi” in the aisles of Reading Terminal Market, entertaining hundreds of Philadelphians, and proving that the perfect accompaniment for all things Italian is a little Verdi!

Awesome.

Corn subsidies and soda taxes

In a recent episode of their Showtime series Bullshit!, Penn and Teller make an observation of something that is so incredibly absurd, and yet so obvious in hindsight that I am surprised I hadn’t thought of it myself. The relevant segment begins in the below clip at about 2:55 (warning–the clip contains heavy profanity):

To summarize: part of the reason soft drinks are so cheap is that corn subsidies make high fructose corn syrup (that bugbear of nutrition nazis everywhere) very cheap. And now that cheap soft drinks are seen as a contributor to the obesity “epidemic,” some state and local governments are moving to slap a sin tax on them. I suppose it would be too much to ask that the government just end corn subsidies. No, that would be far too simple.

Doing what Blofeld, Goldfinger, le Chiffre, Dr. No, and Jaws Couldn’t Do

MGM’s cash crisis kills James Bond. The next movie, which was scheduled to be out in 2012, has been axed. MGM is reportedly £2.4billion in debt and searching for someone to buy them out. Undoubtedly a franchise that venerable (and profitable) will be back at some point, but it may be years and may not feature Daniel Craig, which is a big loss.

Goodbye Mr. Bond!