So, I guess I'm supposed to be upset because Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee compared President Obama to Adolf Hitler the other day. After all, prominent TV news figures have condemned Huckabee's statement. Liberal websites have condemned Huckabee's statement. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has condemned Huckabee's statement. Even President Obama himself has joined in the condemnation.
This president’s foreign policy is the most feckless in American
history. It is so naive that he would trust the Iranians. By doing so,
he will take the Israelis and march them to the door of the oven. This
is the most idiotic thing, this Iran deal. It should be rejected by both
Democrats and Republicans in Congress and by the American people. I
read the whole deal. We gave away the whole store. It’s got to be
stopped.
I would argue that, if you want to claim Huckabee has made an historical analogy, you'd have to conclude from those remarks that he was comparing Obama to Neville Chamberlain, not to Hitler. His suggestion is that Obama's deal with Iran will permit them to make good on their threats against Israel. The ones doing the actual, you know, Hitler-y stuff would be the Iranians. Obama, in Huckabee's opinion, is just an enabler.
Of course, progressives count on the historical illiteracy of large segments of the population...always have, really.
But you know what? Even if Huckabee HAD made the comparison he's accused of making, I could only agree to be outraged by that if the same people complaining now had been just as vocal complaining about the eight years of this I had to put up with:
Funny, but I don't recall any condemnations of this sort of thing from progressive websites (many of them were sources of such imagery, naturally), network news anchors, or then-senators Clinton and Obama. So you'll pardon me if I don't get on board the Indignation Express this time.
"Don't you think you're over-reacting just a bit?"
You know who else liked to eat ants? Hitler, that's who!
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Bonamassa Swag Test Drive
I have fair skin, so I have to be pretty careful when doing things out in the sunshine. When I've been taking my daily walks, I have worn a baseball cap, but that doesn't offer nearly so much protection as my latest acquisition from my hero Joe Bonamassa's cool online store.
I wore the new hat for the first time this morning, and it is quite an improvement. Highly recommended for those occasions when you have to spend any time out in the sun...
"If I had teeth, I'd be biting my tongue right now."
I do have a foot, so I'm more than capable of kicking your ass right now...
I Do Love My Gadgets...
...but I don't get this carried away about it...
From Randall Munroe's delightful xkcd webcomic, which features new comics on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. You should read them.
Perhaps because their audience was so hungry for original material (this cover was released in between the No. 1 hits "I Want to Hold Your Hand" and "She Loves You"), this recording only reached No. 68 on the U.S. charts. It was included on their U.S. release The Beatles' Second Album. Today's send-off is a remastered version of that recording. Enjoy...
There's never any shortage of things to write about, only an occasional shortage in the motivation to write about anything at all. When my Muse is on vacation, it can be a real grind some days...
"Stop whining and get back to work. And don't call me here again..."
Thanks so much...
Anyway, I had intended to write about something entirely different today, but it will have to wait. My ire has been stirred this morning by a fairly preposterous outbreak of what has come to be called "virtue signaling." As someone who has spent a lifetime studying and teaching human communication, this is the kind of thing I have a hard time passing up.
"Virtue signaling" is just a clever way of describing a very familiar phenomenon: Someone does or says something which is intended to indicate that they are morally superior to most of the rest of us. One common manifestation of this kind of preening takes the form of the sanctimonious t-shirt:
But you "don't mind" if I do, right? Funny, I don't remember asking for your permission...
If someone makes an
"I don't give a shit about what you eat" t-shirt, please send me the link...
You've obviously never seen the South Park episode about this sort of thing...
I'm sure you have your own favorite examples. I'm also sure you grasp the fact that eschewing alcohol, or going vegan, or driving a hybrid,
or any of the other behaviors these twits want to make sure we know they engage in will not make anyone else's life any better. Doing such things doesn't make you morally or ethically superior to others. Believing otherwise is a form of mental illness, really.
Now, if this were just about silly narcissists advertising their imagined moral superiority over the rest of us, it would hardly rate a mention here. But this sort of magical thinking isn't just limited to trivial matters.
Quite a lot of people support policies (and, derivatively, the politicians associated with those policies) that are proven to be ineffective, and even downright counterproductive, because of the way supporting those policies (and politicians) makes them feel.
One example of this kind of thing is the Head Start program. People support it because it makes them feel good to support "the school readiness of young children from low-income families." When people like me point out that the program doesn't actually work, supporters of the program ignore the facts and claim that we "hate poor children." We've spent 50 years and billions of dollars on moral preening, when we might have tried other approaches that could have, you know, helped people. That isn't a trivial error.
A similar dynamic plays out whenever the subject of the minimum wage bubbles to the surface of public policy discussions. Supporters of significant increases in the legally mandated minimum wage ignore the evidence that such increases destroy jobs and that the harmful effects impact the very people the increases are supposed to help most. But again, the facts don't matter, only the emotional high supporters get from advocating for increases...
As with birds, self-righteous nitwits of a feather flock together.
If you think that any of the folks holding those signs are interested in examining the actual facts about the issue, then you're the one engaged in magical thinking. And this particular non-trivial error is one that we seem intent on making over and over again, regardless of the evidence.
So, what is the current yardstick for gauging our moral worth that has me so wound up? What has all the moral peacocks strutting around like idiots? This. Swear to God.
It ain't easy being an advocate for truth these days, believe me...
Easier said than done, John...
Things That Make Me Happy: Gratitude Edition
My beloved Kansas City Royals got blown out 12-1 yesterday by the Cleveland Indians at Progressive Field, and the less said about that game the better. Now it's on to the Rogers Centre in Toronto for a four-game series with the Blue Jays starting tonight. The most exciting part of this series will be the Royals debut of Johnny Cueto, scheduled for tomorrow...
In the meantime, though, a tip of the cap to Royals General Manager Dayton Moore, who showed his gratitude for the contributions pitcher Joe Blanton made to the team this year by trading him to the Pittsburgh Pirates, a likely National League playoff team. Joe had been designated for assignment because of the Cueto acquisition, and few would have noticed or cared if the Royals had simply decided after a few days to give him an outright release and left him to fend for himself. Making sure Joe landed on a contending team took time and effort, but it was a nice going-away gift. You're a class act, Dayton...
"Anyone ever tell you you're a sentimental softie, Shu?"
In that weird way that such things often happen, I was reading something yesterday and chanced upon a reference to a musical group I hadn't given a thought to in probably 45 years: Pentangle. I had been quite fond of them during my period of being intensely interested in "folk" music (roughly 1967-69), and became a fan of guitarists Bert Jansch (who passed away in 2011) and John Renbourn (who passed away just a few months ago). It probably helped that I first heard the group right around the time I was reading The Lord of The Rings books for the first time. As a result of that chance encounter, I tracked down and listened to some of their music again for the first time in decades, and found it enthralling.
Today's send-off is one of the group's performances on the BBC sometime in 1970. Enjoy...
There is a lot of baseball today in today's post, because there has been a lot of baseball in my life lately, and certainly anyone seeking to understand me (the ultimate purpose of the blog, after all) will need to figure out the importance of the National Pastime in making me Me. For instance, it helps explain why this was one of my most prized possessions...
...and why I have never quite gotten over losing it.
Baseball isn't my only passion, of course. I also have music (and my guitar harem), literature, model railroading, movies and TV shows, cooking, fine art, collecting Starbuckscoffee mugs, writing, technology, and running the Wild Kingdom Bed & Breakfast. All of these enthusiasms enrich my life, not least because they remind me of how foolish it is to get too caught up in the world of politics and public policy disputes (another of my enthusiasms, as it happens).
For someone like me who employs the rhetorical arts mostly in the realm of politics and public policy, it is easy to forget that, ultimately, almost none of it will matter much. Life will go on, and as the saying goes there are no permanent victories in politics anyway. One hundred years from now, for instance, I am hopeful that the Common Core State Standards Initiative will be nothing more than a quaint memory. That doesn't mean I don't derive some satisfaction from opposing it vigorously now, of course, but I don't let that project consume me.
There are times when I think the progressive world-shapers need nothing so much as to be reminded of the absurdity of thinking they can achieve any sort of of permanent utopia. As Percy Bysshe Shelley reminded us in "Ozymandias," one of the most famous sonnets ever written, that is man's ultimate folly:
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,
Half sunk, a shatter'd visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamp'd on these lifeless things,
The hand that mock'd them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
Nothing beside remains: round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
And I rather imagine Ozymandias accomplished a bit more during his reign than banning the Big Gulp...
Things That Make Me Happy: Clutch Hitting Edition
Last night my beloved Kansas City Royals played Game 2 of their three-game series against the Cleveland Indians at Progressive Field. Unlike Monday night, when the Royals scored early and often and won easily, last night was a tense pitcher's duel. Heading into the 9th inning, the game was a 1-1 tie. Time for some clutch hitting, and 1B Eric Hosmer provided exactly that...
Hosmer already had two hits and had driven in the Royals' only run in the 4th inning when he came to bat with two out in the top of the 9th. Indians' starter Trevor Bauer, who took a tough-luck loss despite pitching a complete game, said after the game that he was trying to pitch around Hosmer. The fateful pitch was a curve that was supposed to bounce before it got to home plate, but Bauer didn't quite get it low enough. Hosmer hit his 11th home run of the season, and Greg Holland got his 22nd save in the bottom of the 9th, aided by a play some are calling The Defensive Play of the Year. All-Star Wade Davis picked up the win, and is now 7-1 with a 0.41 ERA.
"Boom!"
The Royals will send Jeremy Guthrie (7-6, 5.35 ERA) to the mound in this afternoon's finale as they go for the sweep. He'll be opposed by Indians right-hander Corey Kluber (5-11, 3.59). The Royals are 3-0 so far this year against the defending American League Cy Young Award winner, but I take nothing for granted...
"To hear you tell it, they're going to go 0-63 the rest of the way."
Come on, now...I'm not that big a pessimist...most days, anyway...
"You sure they've got WiFi on the beach down there, cowboy?"
I'll figure something out...
Another New Royal
On Tuesday afternoon the Royals announced that they had completed a trade with the Oakland A's, sending minor league pitchers Aaron Brooks and Sean Manaea to the A's in exchange for utility man Ben Zobrist.
While Ben is clearly no longer the player he was during his best seasons, as a switch-hitter who can play multiple infield and outfield positions he will give the Royals some much-needed depth. This will be especially important once those early-season rainouts start turning up on the schedule...
As someone who has followed the Royals for 46 years, though, I'm not quite sure what to think. In their entire history, the team has never pursued the strategy of trading prospects for proven talent during the season, much less during a season when they have the league's best record after four months of play. If adding Zobrist and Johnny Cueto helps the Royals win a World Series title, then it will be hard to argue with the strategy. If we fall short of that goal, however, and Zobrist and Cueto are gone next year, well...
Longtime fan and analyst Rany Jazayerli has a great article up on Grantland that captures this Royals fan's confusion and ambivalence perfectly...
An Advocate's Life in the Information Age
Thanks for Everything, Joe...
In order to make room on the roster for new No. 1 starting pitcher Johnny Cueto, Royals right-hander Joe Blanton was designated for assignment. That doesn't necessarily mean we've seen the last of Joe in Kansas City, but in any event Royals fans are grateful for this contributions this season.
He began the season pitching out of the bullpen, but when the Royals suddenly needed a starter he stepped in and did a professional job. When they no longer needed him in that role, he went back to the bullpen without complaint and pitched well in that role again.
His final (for now) 2015 line: 15 games, 4 starts, 41.2 innings, 2-2, 2 saves, 3.89 ERA. Thanks, Joe...
"Good job, man."
Until Next Time...
Even with the rain we've been having, it has been VERY hot and muggy here in southwest Iowa of late. And, as usual, these really warm summer days and nights put me in mind of...well, something I never did even once in my life, but which always looked like a lot of fun: surfing.
When I was a kid, beach movies were fairly popular, and everyone in them looked like they were having a blast, especially the surfers. If only I had been able to swim...and been athletic enough...and lived near an ocean...well, watching stuff like today's send-off video is the closest I ever got. But somehow, hearing The Beach Boys on a hot summer day always seems to make me a surfer, at least in my own mind. Enjoy...
Some nitwit former politician (a redundancy, I know) in Oklahoma has announced that the details of the divorce of two popular country music stars are being unjustly concealed from a scandal-hungry public
Or maybe I should spend some more time talking philosophy with my good buddies...
"Sweet! I'm down!"
"Me too!"
"Me three!"
Sorry, guys. I'm just not into it today...
It's Tuesday (the most depressing day of the week), it rained this morning (which makes typing painful), and my muse is sunning herself on a beach somewhere, so...
"Really? Are you sure your legions of fans can take the disappointment?"
Shut your pipe...it's not like there's no post at all today...
Things That Make Me Happy: Milestones Edition
Last night my beloved Kansas City Royals began a 10-game road trip by taking on the Cleveland Indians at Progressive Field. The Royals won the game 9-4, becoming the first team in the American League to reach 60 wins on the season; they're still the only team in the American League that has not yet lost a 40th time...
The Royals got off to a quick start, as 1B Eric Hosmer (who was given the day off on Sunday) cracked a three-run home run in the first inning...
"Boom!"
2B Omar Infante added a solo home run (his first of the season) in the 2nd, and DH Kendrys Morales gave starter Edinson Volquez some breathing room with a two-run double in the 5th inning that made it 7-1. A pair of runs in the top of the 7th made it 9-1, so when Volquez walked the first two batters in the bottom of the inning (ball four to the second batter was his 111th pitch) and Joe Blanton (just trying to throw strikes with a big lead) gave up a three-run home run, the Royals still led comfortably. Blanton pitched three full innings, earning his second save of the season the old-fashioned way. Volquez improved his record to 10-5, 3.21 ERA.
Game 2 of the series tonight will find Chris Young (8-6, 3.32 ERA) taking the mound for the Royals against the Tribe's Trevor Bauer (8-7, 4.29).
Wild Kingdom Bed & Breakfast Update
Yesterday there was a new customer visiting the B&B for the first time. Around 3:30 in the afternoon, I happened to see a goldfinch snacking on the thistle sock...
"And some mighty tasty thistle seed it is, too. My compliments."
You're very welcome...
I knew there were American Goldfinches in my neighborhood, as I had seen them every once in awhile when out doing my exercise walks, and of course they're the state bird of Iowa. Yesterday was the first time I ever saw one stop by the B&B, though. I saw another one this morning, but of course there's no way of telling if it was the same one.
That brings to 10 the number of different species that have visited at least occasionally, not counting the purple martins who swoop in from time to time to snag some flying insects, and the fat-ass robins who snack on worms and bugs not far from my patio...
"Wait, what??? You're calling me a 'fat-ass'? That's ironic, to say the least."
Neither one of you is funny, so zip it...
My Favorite TV Villain?
Well, perhaps "favorite" is too strong a word, but it struck me while I was watching a TV show yesterday just how often villains played by actor Garret Dillahunt have been dealt with by my TV heroes...
Sam Waterston as Jack McCoy
Dillahunt was convicted of murder twice by ADA Jack McCoy on Law and Order, once as white supremacist Julian Preuss in 2002, and once as unscrupulous political operative Eric Lund in 2006.
Timothy Olyphant as Seth Bullock
In between those two performances, Dillahunt played Jack McCall, killer of Wild Bill Hickok, on HBO's Deadwood in 2004. He was brought to justice by lawman Seth Bullock.
Thomas Gibson as Aaron Hotchner
Dillahunt played quadraplegic serial killer Mason Turner on Criminal Minds in 2009. He was caught by Aaron Hotchner and his BAU team, but shot to death by the brother of one of his victims before he could be taken in to face murder charges...
Jeffrey Donovan as Michael Westen
Dillahunt had a recurring role as spy-turned-psychopath Simon Escher on Burn Notice, until he was finally stabbed to death by Michael Westen in 2013.
Timothy Olyphant as Raylan Givens
Dillahunt appeared in several episodes of the final season of Justified as Ty Walker, a hired assassin. Of course he proved to be no match for U.S. Marshal Raylan Givens, and his final scene included this classic bit of dialogue:
Ty: This is bullshit! You shot me in the back!
Raylan: If you wanted me to shoot you in the front, you shoulda run toward me.
Until Next Time...
Speaking of Justified, all but one of the show's six seasons included a rendition of Kentucky native Darrell Scott's song "You'll Never Leave Harlan Alive," typically as each season's last episode ended. They used the Brad Paisley version a couple of times, as well as versions by Dave Alvin and the Ruby Friedman Orchestra. Fittingly, the final season's final episode featured a performance of the song by Scott himself, which is today's send-off. It came at the midpoint of the episode, though, at an especially dramatic moment. Enjoy...
We have understood the basics of argumentation and persuasion ever since Aristotle set them out in Rhetoric back in the 4th century BC. One of those basic principles is that the advocate, if she/he is to be successful, must speak accurately about factual matters. The advocate's ethos (a critical element of persuasion) requires the audience to accept that the advocate has sufficient knowledge of the relevant subject matter to speak intelligently about it. An ethical advocate knows this to be so, and acts accordingly. In other words...
"Don't be sayin' shit you can't prove."
Actually, Ari, the maxim I had in mind is semper necessitas probandi incumbit ei qui agit, typically rendered in English as "he who asserts must prove." In order to persuade others to accept your opinions on issues, in other words, you need to be able to demonstrate that the facts upon which those opinions rest are, you know, facts. Your arguments must meet the requirements of logic as well, but that's a subject for another time. My conundrum is what to think about advocates who base their arguments on demonstrable falsehoods. I want to believe that most advocates in the public arena are arguing in good faith, but...
Consider, for instance, an article by Christopher Ingraham that appeared in The Washington Post a few days ago which claims that we have averaged a mass shooting per day in this country so far in 2015. Even for people who don't follow the issue closely, that doesn't sound quite right. Most people would be inclined to suspect that Mr. Ingraham must be doing something a little screwy with the way he's counting things. And, of course, he is.
Now the REAL question, for me, is whether Mr. Ingraham knows that his factual claim is false, or whether he actually believes what he has written is true. If it's the latter, he's obviously too ill-informed to be taken seriously on the issue, and should shut up about it until he has his facts straight. If it's the former...well, if that's the case one hopes that karma is a real thing, and Mr. Ingraham will receive his due for his prevarications.
Another instance of the same sort of thing:
Needless to say, given her recent public statements I am less likely to give serialfabulist Cecile Richards the benefit of the doubt. She knows she's lying, but hopes you won't bother to fact-check her spin. As the old saying goes, every word she utters is a lie, including "a," "an," and "the." I have little confidence that justice will be done in her case in this world. The next, on the other hand, will be a whole 'nother ballgame...
Things That Make Me Happy: Funny Game Edition
One of the great delights of being a baseball fan is that you just never know what is going to happen in any given game. My beloved Kansas City Royals were struggling to score runs over their past three games (just 3 runs over their past 27 innings, an average of 1 run per game), and on Sunday at Kauffman Stadium faced Houston Astros ace Dallas Keuchel, starter for the American League in the recent All-Star Game and the league leader in wins (12) and ERA (2.12). Keuchel had thrown eight scoreless innings against them in Houston less than a month ago. On top of that, two of their best hitters, All-Stars Mike Moustakas and Eric Hosmer, were held out of the game because they bat left-handed and Keuchel might be the toughest lefthander in the league right now.
So, of course the Royals would score four runs off of Keuchel before he recorded three outs. Of course they would. It didn't look promising after the Royals had the bases loaded with no outs, and had two straight runners thrown out at home on ground balls, but Omar Infante came through with a two-out, two-run single, and rookie Cheslor Cuthbert hit his first major league double to make it 4-0...
"Dallas Who?"
All-Star center fielder Lorenzo Cain added a solo home run in the 2nd, his 11th of the season, and Yordano Ventura showed why he was the Opening Day starter, scattering six hits and allowing only a single run in 7 innings. Ventura had
struggled so mightily of late that he was recently demoted to AAA, only
to be brought back due to the season-ending injury to Jason Vargas. You'd have never known it to watch him pitch on Sunday: 1 earned run, 0 walks, 5 strikeouts. The bullpen didn't allow a baserunner in the 8th and 9th, and the Royals had a satisfying 5-1 victory.
After finishing their last July homestand at 4-2, the Royals hit the road for games with the Indians, Blue Jays, and Tigers. The team won't see Kauffman Stadium again until August 7...
Mug Shot
I hadn't bought a new Starbucks coffee mug in awhile (the last new one was the "Siren's Tail" mug back in 2014), mostly because there haven't been any releases lately that appealed to me much.
Yesterday, though, I saw this one at the Starbucks outlet in my local Hy-Vee, and next thing you know...
"Admit it. You've lost count of how many Starbucks mugs you own, haven't you?"
I actually have, yes. Is that a bad thing?
The Newest Royal
On Sunday, the Royals announced that they had completed a trade with the Cincinnati Reds to bring Reds ace and All-Star starting pitcher Johnny Cueto (runner-up in last year's National League Cy Young vote) to Kansas City in exchange for young pitching prospects Brandon Finnegan, John Lamb, and Cody Reed.
It is exciting to add a player of this caliber to the team, of course, and I'm sure Johnny will enjoy having the Royals' All-Star bullpen backing him up, as well as having our historically awesome defense behind him. Cueto is also reportedly happy about being reunited with fellow Dominican Edinson Volquez, with whom he was a teammate for four years in Cincinnati when he first came up. I hope that means he'd be interested in staying with the team for awhile. He's eligible to become a free agent at the end of the season, though, and it is unlikely the Royals would be able to match the best offers he will attract. He'd have to really want to stay in KC.
The likeliest scenario is that the Royals traded Finnegan, Lamb, and Reed for two months of Cueto's services, plus postseason play. If he leaves, the team would also get a draft pick as compensation for another team signing him. Right now, both the team and its fan base are focused on this season. Having gone 29 years between postseason appearances, the Royals and their fans understand full well that opportunities must be siezed upon when they come along...
"I looked great in red, but I'll look awesome in Royals blue!"
Say "Hello" to India
As I wrote about here, my first encounter with my hero Joe Bonamassa and his music was watching the video of his 2009 concert at the Royal Albert Hall on a PBS broadcast in December 2010. The whole show was amazing, but he converted me from fan to fanatic with the encore (see today's send-off). The guitar he was playing at that point in the show was an Ernie Ball Music Man 25th Anniversary model, which I had never seen before. I learned what it was by doing a little online research the next day. And I decided I wanted to own one...
"Because of course you did."
Mind your own business, please...
Anyway, what I didn't realize at first was that those guitars were only made for one year. They were really, really scarce. And so, like Ahab scouring the oceans for Moby Dick, I tried to locate this particular guitar. By the time I had been searching for about a year and a half with no success I was ready to give up the quest. But, as often happens, I managed to find India (named for the song Joe was playing during that encore) in the unlikeliest of places. A session musician in Los Angeles was "thinning the herd," as guitar collectors sometimes do, and had decided to part with her...
I had found her just in the nick of time, too, because just a few days after FedEx delivered her to me...
...I got to meet Joe in person prior to his concert in Omaha on April 26, 2012. The necktie I'm wearing features him playing his iteration of the guitar at the RAH show. I had it made by Zazzle just for the occasion.
The only difference between India and Joe's guitar is that India has the tremolo bridge.
Meeting Joe and having him "meet" India was, of course, a peak life experience, as was getting to take a student a mine along to meet him as well. My student got his Stratocaster signed by Joe, but I was so nervous I forgot to ask him to sign India. I shared the story about my brain cramp with my friends on Joe's fan forum, and honestly I think I'd rather have the funny story to tell anyway. I did get his autographs on Karla's and Paula's pickguards at a subsequent meeting...
Until Next Time...
Today's send-off is Joe playing that first encore at his dream-come-true 2009 concert at the Royal Albert Hall. It begins with him performing the instrumental composition "India" (from his 2007 album Sloe Gin) and ends with "Mountain Time" (from his 2002 album So It's Like That), perhaps Joe's best-loved song among his fans. India and I both invite you to enjoy...
