A bit of legalese

I enjoy legalese. I think most law students do, though they pretend not to. As mere students, we have none of the status, money, and power that lawyers like to show off to the laity. So, we must make do with what we do have: words... lots and lots of words. If you're unfortunate enough to know law student, you'll know what I'm talking about. He's an example from a book about the law of real property:

The future interest retained by the grantor of a fee simple determinable is a possibility of reverter; the future interest arising in the grantor of a fee simple on condition subsequent is a right of entry for condition broken.

If you ever hear a law student say something like that, you can probably go ahead and punch him in the stomach. He won't sue you because he's too busy studying. And he won't fight back because he knows if his response is disproportionate and he ends up killing you, he'll probably be liable for manslaughter.

Neil deGrasse Tyson Gets It

D.J. Grothe recently interviewed Neil deGrasse Tyson on the Point of Inquiry podcast (again). That guy gets it, man. Here's what he had to say about our old friend, Science v. Religion:

The conflict is not whether or not you're going to Heaven of Hell, or whether or not you believe Jesus is your savior. That's not where the conflict is. That's not what's going on in the school boards. What's going on in the school boards are people who, based on their religious texts, assert that they have knowledge of the physical universe that is demonstrably false. That's where the conflict is. And I got something to say about that.... If you're going to tell me that Noah had dinosaurs on his ark, I am sorry, you are ignorant and scientifically illiterate. And you don't belong in the science classroom.... You want to teach that in Bible school, I'm not going to go knocking on your door to stop you. By the way, there is no tradition of scientists beating down the door of Sunday school, saying, 'That might not necessarily be right.' Yet, you have fundamentalist religious communities trying to knock down the door of the science classroom. And that asymmetry there bothers me.... [T]he moment you take your religion and put it into the science classroom and claim something that is demonstrably false, I'm going to be up in your face, telling you, "Go learn about how the universe works."

My hero, Neil deGrasse Tyson.

Scott Green's patented "Five Minute Study Plan"

Here is a great column from UIUC College of Law 2L Scott Green.

This part is great, for those of you who only have the time (or the attention span) for short bits of reading:

I've also learned how to procrastinate in tiers. How it works is, instead of studying, I'll decide to clean; but cleaning is boring too, so I'll decide to go for a jog. But jogging takes effort, so before I head out for my jog, I play some Madden '08. But video games can be frustrating, so before I finish it, I take a little nap: the fourth degree of procrastination. Of course, once my nap is over, I will get right back to that Madden game, so I can finish up that jog, so I can clean my apartment, so I can study. But first, I should probably get something to eat...

Tennessee, I don't care for you

If you need a reason to dislike Tennessee (I know I have more than a few), here's a real gem from the state constitution.

No atheist shall hold a civil office.

No person who denies the being of God, or a future state of rewards and punishments, shall hold any office in the civil department of this State.

Tenn. Const. Art. IX, § 2

It was written a long, long time ago, when Bible Belt Christians didn't have political correctness and the ACLU to hinder their efforts, but it's still the law today.

Mitt Romney throws the dogs a bone

If you're ever looking for an example of specious inanity, this is it. Mitt Romney spoke in front of a group of conservative Christian leaders in Texas [I feel sick just thinking about such a setting], and this is what he said.

Freedom requires religion, just as religion requires freedom. Freedom opens the windows of the soul so that man can discover his most profound beliefs and commune with God. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.

Ewww. Don't you feel dirty now? It's so imbecilic I shouldn't even have to refute it, but sadly, this is the kind of tripe that the demos just lap up like hog slop. So, here we go... [sigh]

#1. Freedom requires religion.
No, it doesn't. Proof: Europe. More freedom, less religion. Icelanders, Norwegians, Swedes, and yes, even the French, all have more civil liberties and much less religiousness than Americans.
#2. Religion requires freedom.
Gah, even George Bush wouldn't say something so stupid. There is very little freedom in the Muslim world, and the fact that it's called the Muslim world should tell you how much religion there is. (A lot.) Next.
#3. Freedom opens the windows of the soul...
Ohhh... kay. First, souls are just pretend. Second, even if they were real, no one ever said they had windows. And even if they did have windows, what evidence is there that freedom would open them? Yes, I know, this is just a metaphor, but let me tell you, it's a bad one. Maybe you could get away with "Love opens the windows of the soul" or "Music..." or even "Ben & Jerry's Berried Treasure Sorbet..." but freedom? Come on, Mitt. Get a speech writer with some, ahem, writing skills.
#4. ...man can discover his most profound beliefs...
I actually like his use of "man" instead of "humankind" or "people" or some other lame compromise of a PC word. But I do not like the idea of discovering beliefs. You can't do that. If you believe something, you know you believe it. If you didn't know and you had to "discover" that you believed it, you could hardly call it a belief, now could you?
#5. ... commune with God.
You can have that one, although it might be a topic for another discussion. But not here.
#6. Freedom and religion endure together, or perish alone.
Yikes! Someone tell Mitt Romney that the Cold War is over. Again, just look at Europe: lots of freedom doing just fine without religion. No perishing going on there. And now the Muslim world: lots of religion cranking alone with very little freedom to help it out. No signs of perishing in sight, unfortunately.

I didn't read the rest of the speech. I don't even want to imagine what other nuggets of horse hockey I might find.

Losing faith in democracy

There is nothing like a presidential election to get the cynical juices flowing. People like to blame politicians for the flaws of our government. But there is only one place to lay the blame in a democracy: in the demos itself. And if you pay attention, you'll soon realize, that our demos are idiots.

Learn Something

"In the seventeenth century, a theologian called James Usher worked out the age of the universe based on the chronology of the Bible. It was created, he concluded, in a week in October 4004 B.C. Even today, millions of people still believe that this seventeenth-century calculation is about right, and that the overwhelming evidence of geology, cosmology, paleontology, chemistry, astrophysics, geophysics, stratigraphy, and biology is wrong. . . ."

This makes me laugh every single time

Family Guy - The Big Bang - For more of the funniest videos, click here
Jesus... USA #1. Ha.

Somebody Please Mess with Texas

And if your right hand causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away; it is better for you to lose one of your members than for your whole body to go into hell. Matthew 5:30

Maybe there is hope yet for this country, but I think it may be necessary to first cut out the cancer of a state called Texas. Look how beautiful this map is.

If you're wondering why I'm feeling so antitexican, read this article.

I've never trusted Texas, and it doesn't look like things will be changing soon.

Help me, world!

Sometimes I think this country is just beyond help.

Poll finds more Americans believe in devil than Darwin.

[Sigh] I'm surrounded by troglodytes. (If you don't know what a troglodyte is, but you're pretty sure it's not in the Bible so you'd rather not know what it means, you are one.)

[Edit: And this graph from a couple years ago is still pissing me off.]

My favorite Illustration

There are publications called "Restatements of the Law." They are very useful. Most sections have something called illustrations -- examples, often taken from real cases, that show how the rule in a particular section applies. My favorite is illustration number 17 of section 222A (conversion) of the Second Restatement of Torts. (Conversion is like the civil law equivalent of larceny. If someone takes your stuff, don't call the police and get him thrown in jail, call your lawyer and get paid.) Here it is:

A intentionally shoots B's horse, as a result of which the horse dies. This is a conversion.

It makes me smile every time. :)

Another gem from Bill Maher

"If you, the citizen, deliberately vote for someone who won't give you health care over someone who will, you need to have your head examined. Except, you can't afford to have your head examined."

Matthew Chapman hits a home-run

"For a feminist to still believe in God is like a freed slave still living on the plantation."

The Petty and Spiteful Son of Man

In the morning, when he returned to the city, he was hungry. And seeing a fig tree by the side of the road, he went to it and found nothing at all on it but leaves. Then he said to it, "May no fruit ever come from you again!" And the fig tree withered at once.

Matthew 21:18-19

The State of Tennessee begs the question

I swear I haven't distorted the meaning of this, only edited out the parts that might mask the beauty of its logic.

Every murder . . . committed in the perpetration of . . . any murder in the first degree . . . is murder in the first degree.

Any questions?

From the people charged with finding me a job...

Here is a brief excerpt from a section of my Career Planning and Professional Development Handbook concerning resumes:

You may wish to list any publications, either published or unpublished . . . .

So, my career counselor wants me to include my unpublished publications. Well, I've got lots of those!

Hey, a funny!

If the text is too small, click to zoom in. I believe the author asks eight questions in-a-row before he decides to break the insanity with a joke, in the form of a question -- no, two! -- of course.

Also, note the use of the verb "burgle" near the top there. You like that, don't you? I know I do.

I miss good writing

It's sad the kind of writing that moves me these days. Judicial opinions, especially concerning contract law, are so dull and tedious that even passages like this give me a little flutter:

[T]here can be no unconscionable enrichment, no advantage upon which the law will frown, when the result is but to give one party to a contract only what the other has promised; particularly where, as here, the delinquent has had full payment for the promised performance.

Justice Stone, Groves v. John Wunder Co., 286 N.W. 235 (Minn. 1939). You see, lawyers don't have it so easy. Stuff like this is the best part of what we have to read all day long.

The Problem of Evil

Let's start with two views of this problem, one from the East and one from the West. First, the Bhûridatta Jataka, a Buddhist text making clear the Buddha's stance on the existence of an all-powerful creator-god:

If the creator of the world entire
They call God, of every being be the Lord
Why does he order such misfortune
And not create concord?

If the creator of the world entire
They call God, of every being be the Lord
Why prevail deceit, lies and ignorance
And he such inequity and injustice create?

If the creator of the world entire
They call God, of every being be the Lord
Then an evil master is he, (O Aritta)
Knowing what's right did let wrong prevail!

And now from Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion, by David Hume, a Scottish philosopher of some note, paraphrasing Epicurus, a Greek philosopher also of some note:

Is [God] willing to prevent evil, but not able? then is he impotent.
Is he able, but not willing? then is he malevolent.
Is he both able and willing? whence then is evil?

For those who haven't read their Shakespeare in a while, you'll remember that "whence" means "from what place or source."

Most Christians who grapple with this problem are unwilling to budge on God's power and love, so, as a consequence, most attempts at theodicy (a solution to the Problem of Evil), attack the evil factor. It seems the most common argument is that what we experience as evil is not really evil: it's all part of God's divine plan, and since we don't really know what God considers evil and has in store for us, it is too presumptuous of we humans to question him.

My first response to such an argument is this: Read Genesis. The Bible says evil exists. God created it, albeit via woman, and them blamed it on the rest of us. The Bible makes this all very clear. So no dice on the no evil argument.

Second, it matters little to a starving child or a tortured hostage what God thinks of evil and what his overall plan might be for the world. Real people suffer real pain unceasingly. Whether we can understand God is irrelevant. He should understand us. He should know that what may be a trifling occurrence in his grander scheme is often of great import and consequence to us piddling mortals.

This is why, from a theological and exegetic perspective, I have more respect for the Westboro Baptists who are at least honest about the wrath and spleen of God than I do for the Jesusfreaks who only want to talk about his infinite love for me and the world. Pshaw!

What's a guy gotta do to appear to be in distress?

Here's something a real man said in front of a real judge in a real case:

"Ziolkowski testified that he observed a man lying [face down] on the [train station] floor . . . . Ziolkowski testified that the man did not appear to be injured or in distress."

That must be a rough neighborhood where people lie face down on the train station floor and it's not considered a sign of distress.

Poor Lawyers

There are 16 optometry schools in the country. That's why they say, "C=OD" (you pass, you graduate). And implicit in this maxim is another, namely, that OD=job.

That's not the case, unfortunately, for graduates and graduates-to-be of the nation's 196 accredited law schools. (Yes, there are unaccredited law schools, too. And yes, people who pay good money for a law degree knowing they still won't be allowed sit for the bar deserve to be poor, so let's ignore them for now.) Read this article from the Wall Street Journal. If you're not a lawyer/law student, you'll probably be happy to know that most lawyers are poorly paid, very unhappy people with a lot of regrets.

I'm an intellectual...

and I have the "candid" photograph to prove it.

long time, no post

I've been busy will school, but I took time out to watch the Islam segment of the God's Warriors program on CNN. The part that struck me was the growth of pious, young Muslims in the United States. This bothered me greatly. I dislike Christian piety because it's anti-scientific, celebrates ignorance, and generally makes us look like a backward people to the rest of the world. Islamic piety on the other hand... well, that's just dangerous stuff, man. Convert, be enslaved, or die. Those are the three choices the Koran gives to any infidel (that's you) who is faced with an "offer" to convert to Islam. Some Muslims might not be so literal (not to mention barbaric), but then, they really can't call themselves pious, can they? Anyway, here's what one Muslim American Princess from Long Island had to say about her religion:

A lot of people go to the church on Sunday, and that's their religion for their week. Mine is every single day, every minute of my day."

Humble, isn't she?

Textbook Authors Eat Babies

The whole textbook industry, at least at the university level, is a big ugly scam. New editions come out every few years, usually with no substantial changes to the content. Law school books are particularly bad. But I think many law students, especially ones who have never had a job, almost enjoy overpaying for their books, kind of like they're practicing for after graduation when they'll have money to burn. Well, until that day comes, I don't have money to burn, and I was sickened by the price of books at our bookstore. Enjoy the following exchanged that took place over lunch during orientation.

ME: The books for our section cost $600 if you buy them at the bookstore.
OTHER GUY: That's really not bad. I've paid over 700 before.
ANOTHER GUY: Yeah, 600? That's pretty standard.

$600 for one semester's books is bad. Really bad. I've gotten mine for around $200, same books, just used and not from the blood-sucking bookstore. That is really not bad. Textbooks should be included in tuition and every professor who writes them should take a pay cut to pay for them. Dirty baby-eaters.

4.0

Tomorrow it begins. Orientation at University of Illinois College of Law.
Four. Point. Oh.

Goodbye, Japan

Today is my last full day in the land of cold noodles and hot sake. It should be super emotional, especially since I'm leaving my family behind, but they'll follow me in a couple weeks, and we'll all be back for New Year's probably. So, while my residence and daily routine will change, it's not like I'm leaving Japan forever. But I am sad to leave. I'm really dreading some aspects of American life, like born-again Christians and shop clerks with bad attitudes, things one never worries about here. But, I can get decent pizza and highways don't cost $10 an hour to drive.

Well, time to cancel my cell phone and zero out my bank account.

Sayonara

A challenge for creationists

There's a reason creation myths are called myths: They're myths! Stories. Not true. They were all made up at a time when people became self-aware and started to wonder about the universe, but hadn't the ability to answer the questions. From the "infancy of our humanity." And yes, this includes the story in your religion's special book, too. It's not special just because it's the one you happened to have learned in Friday/Saturday/Sunday/home school.

I have a challenge for you. Google the term "creation myths" and spend a good half-hour reading as many as you can, all the while keeping in mind that somewhere out there, there is (or at least was) someone or some many who believe the myth you're reading is true. I think you'll find that to be quite silly. Then, once you've got a taste for the goofy stories people fall for, go ahead and read the one you believe in one more time, and read it well. Notice any similarities?

This is what happens when creationism gets out of control:

Water collected after Noah's flood, it breached its earthen dam, and the water rushed in very quickly and carved out the canyon in a matter of weeks.

That's Mark Looy, Creation Musem co-founder, explaining how the Grand Canyon was created. Any 5th-grader worth his salt in science class knows this is a bunch of nonsense. Sigh. I can't write anymore about this. It gives me all kinds of bad feelings.

Good Christians don't revolt.

Most people, including myself, when they refute the claim that [begin southern accent] "America is a Christian nation," [end accent] usually go to the Constitution or the Declaration of Independence or other documents of the time. This never works to convince the faithheads. It's never enough.

Let's trying looking at it from the other direction. Instead of asking the Founders what they thought about Jesus, let's ask Jesus what he thinks about them. The answer can be found in Romans 13:1-2.

Let every soul be subject unto the higher powers. For there is no power but of God: the powers that be are ordained of God. Whosoever therefore resisteth the power, resisteth the ordinance of God: and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation.

This was actually written by Paul, not Jesus (Jesus, apparently never bothered to write anything down), but there it is, the inspired word of God. Revolutionaries go to Hell, and a country founded by such Hell-bound sinners should not be so confident in its Christianly status.

The Gall of the Apostle Paul

This is a good one. If you can find a way to work this into a conversation with a fundamentalist, just sit back and enjoy the show.

Colossians 1:24

Now I rejoice in what I am suffering for you, and I fill up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ’s afflictions, for the sake of his body, which is the church.

(Emphasis added.) Do you understand what Paul is saying here? In general, he's just saying that he's been called upon to build Christ's church, and though the task is sometimes trying (he was in a Roman jail at the time), he is happy to suffer for our sake. That's all well and good. But what's this business about the lacking of Christ's afflictions? Paul has made it clear that [born-agains, cover your eyes] Christ's sacrifice was not enough. The church is also necessary, and without it, the suffering of Christ alone would not be sufficient. Paul's suffering, for the sake of the church, completes the task. So it would seem ye Christians have two choices: 1) accept Jesus Christ as your personal savior AND the Church as necessary for salvation, or 2) continue to think your personal relationship with Jesus will be enough, and that St. Paul either didn't know what he was talking about, or he was an uppity blasphemer. Happy deciding!

Template Change and the Big Red A

I changed the template of the blog. I really like the way the photo sits flush with the header. I think it's neat.

I also added a big, red 'A' to the sidebar. Click it to find out why. Here, too.

Update: I also put spaces in the title. That was long overdue, I think.

Moses: another mass-murdering pedophile

I just had to share this in case anyone out there thinks the Bible is a good source of morality and family values.

Numbers 31:17-18

Now therefore kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman that hath known man by lying with him. But all the women children, that have not known a man by lying with him, keep alive for yourselves.

Those were the days, weren't they? No pornography or rampant homosexuality to threaten our wholesome Judeo-Christian values... like genocide and sexual slavery of children. Bring America back to God. Otherwise He just might kill your sons and rape your daughters.

So who was this Joshua character?

And that day Joshua took Makkedah, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof he utterly destroyed, them, and all the souls that were therein; he let none remain: and he did to the king of Makkedah as he did unto the king of Jericho.

Then Joshua passed from Makkedah, and all Israel with him, unto Libnah, and fought against Libnah:

And the LORD delivered it also, and the king thereof, into the hand of Israel; and he smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein; he let none remain in it; but did unto the king thereof as he did unto the king of Jericho.

And Joshua passed from Libnah, and all Israel with him, unto Lachish, and encamped against it, and fought against it:

And the LORD delivered Lachish into the hand of Israel, which took it on the second day, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein, according to all that he had done to Libnah.

Then Horam king of Gezer came up to help Lachish; and Joshua smote him and his people, until he had left him none remaining.

And from Lachish Joshua passed unto Eglon, and all Israel with him; and they encamped against it, and fought against it:

And they took it on that day, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and all the souls that were therein he utterly destroyed that day, according to all that he had done to Lachish.

And Joshua went up from Eglon, and all Israel with him, unto Hebron; and they fought against it:

And they took it, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof, and all the souls that were therein; he left none remaining, according to all that he had done to Eglon; but destroyed it utterly, and all the souls that were therein.

And Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, to Debir; and fought against it:

And he took it, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof; and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed all the souls that were therein; he left none remaining: as he had done to Hebron, so he did to Debir, and to the king thereof; as he had done also to Libnah, and to her king.

So Joshua smote all the country of the hills, and of the south, and of the vale, and of the springs, and all their kings: he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the LORD God of Israel commanded.

And Joshua smote them from Kadeshbarnea even unto Gaza, and all the country of Goshen, even unto Gibeon.

And all these kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, because the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel.

Joshua 10:28-42

Apparently he was a mass-murdering dick.

I'm a big kid now.

Some atheists don't like the word atheism because it gives too much credit to theism. After all, we don't have special words for people who don't believe in Zeus, gnomes, or the Easter Bunny. One alternative a lot people like is humanism, which just sidesteps the whole deity question and focuses on human issues. The trouble with that is that there is more to life than just other humans. Others like naturalism. This is my personal favorite. Naturalism is a philosophical viewpoint that simply rejects the supernatural. If what you're saying has no basis in nature and observable reality, you shouldn't be taken seriously. Even if there were an omnipotent yet short-tempered sky-god who created our world, he would be a natural, albeit incredible, being. All of his powers would have a natural explanation, just like David Copperfield's. It's a great philosophy, in my opinion, but the problem with it is if you tell someone you're a naturalist, it sounds more like you're a 19-century artist than an atheist.

There's nothing out there that really sums up what we all want to say in one word: Well, if you must know, technically, I'm an atheist, but I resent even being asked such a primitive question in the 21st century. While were at it, what are your views on Hercules as a half-human/half-god savior or the Shinto creation story versus evolution?

But I think I've finally cracked it. Who believes in ghosts and goblins, witches and trolls, spirits and fairies, unicorns and Santa Claus? Who believes in these fairy tales? Children. When you realize that belief in Jesus Christ and Heaven is no more sophisticated than belief in the Peter Pan and Neverland, it seems like overkill to make up fancy words for disbelief. We already have a word for people who don't believe fantastic stories for children: adults.

So the next time someone asks me my religion, I'm going to say something like, "I know I look young, and thank you for asking, but I'm an adult. I stopped putting my teeth under that pillow a long time ago."

No more teenagers for me

No, I'm not referring to my New Year's resolution to stop preying on Japanese schoolgirls. I'm talk about my job, which also happens to involve a few hundred Japanese schoolgirls (and boys). My last class as an Assistant Language Teacher in Kitahiroshima Town ended less than an hour ago. To be honest, if it is bittersweet, it's a lot more sweet than it is bitter. I was only at this particular school for one term, so I didn't really get to know any of the students very well. Also, this school is a bit bigger than the others, so there are quite a few little assholes who make working here more difficult than it should be. Japanese kids are generally more well-behaved than their American counterparts, probably because of the conformity factor, but they're still people, and some of them are complete jerk-offs. The problem in Japan is there's a serious lack of discipline in school even when it is sorely needed. The system is just not designed to account for bad behavior, as if no one wants to acknowledge that not all Japanese kids are perfect little automatons.

Actually, I'm glad I was able to teach at a place like this, especially right at the end, and only for a short time. It will help to take the edge off my sadness when I leave Japan. As much as I'd like to stay here, and as much as I'm not looking forward to living in the Heartland, working at this school is something I will not be missing, except the free coffe and tea, of course.

New York Times gets it wrong again

Opinions are fine in news stories. Untruths do not belong.

There's an article on today's online NYT called Abstinence Education Faces Uncertain Future. It's a fairly innocuous article about some Texans who are upset because abstinence education is losing favor simply because it doesn't work. Fine. If people want to argue that we should keep spending money on programs that have been shown to be completely ineffective, they're free to do that. But in doing so, they really should start an opinion with "I think," instead of stating it as fact, and journalists should really be able to tell the difference.

The article quotes one Eric Love (Awesome name for a virgin, eh?), director of the East Texas Abstinence Program, as saying, "You have to look at why sex was created... [it] was created to bond two people together." There are two problems with this. First, sex was not created. There's no debate here -- no intelligent one, at least. It evolved, just like everything else in biology, including you and me. Second, it didn't evolve to bond two people together. It evolved because natural selection favors genetic diversity. We aren't the only animals that have sex, you know. I wonder if Mr. Love thinks sex was created to bind together sea turtles and tapeworms, too. If it was, it doesn't work very well. The percentage of monogamous species in the sexual world is extremely low. What are all those adulterous animals doing making a mockery of our sacred rite?

The truth is, we humans have made a shameful mockery of the wonder of sex. It is one of the most amazing evolutionary developments in the history of life. If not for sex, we'd still be stuck in the primordial soup stage. But a few thousand years ago, we started telling each other ghost stories, and now we, particularly we Americans, have the mental and emotional sexual maturity of schoolchildren. Sex is not bad. It's not offensive to any uptight sky-gods. And your future spouse will not love you more if you "save it." So, please, grow up, people.

Omiyamairi

Hiro-kun paid his first visit to a Shinto shrine, called an "omiya," this weekend. Check out this fantastic photo album I made. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the actual ceremony since I had things to do. I think my father-in-law did, so I'll try to get them up soon.

Worst Mission Statement Ever

This is the mission statement posted on the website of Andover Central School in Andover, New York, my alma mater.

Our Mission Capstone

The mission of the Andover Central School System is to inspire within all the desire to learn, to succeed, and to expand the horizon for each individual. Our school will be a safe teaching community, which celebrates our achievements and encourages active partnerships with families and the entire community. We will empower our students to embrace the challenges as worthy citizens in our American society of representative democracy.

Let's start at the top. What the hell is a mission capstone? If you've never heard this term before, don't feel bad; it's nonsense. The author (insert your own air-quotes) has used the word "captsone" way out of context. This is not a particularly propitious start to a school's mission statement.

The lack of parallelism in the first sentence is so awkward even our author should have been able to catch it. And when did Andover get a school system? New York City has a school system. Los Angeles has a school system. Andover has a school. There are other problems with this sentence, but there are more pressing matters ahead.

The next sentence is my favorite because it almost passes as acceptable, especially when compared to the others around it. It's long, which always helps to mask an author's ineptitude, but there's one big problem: the word "community" appears twice in this sentence, each time referring to {cough} different communities. That, dear reader, is not good style. This sentence, too, has more problems. (Who would encourage inactive partnerships?) But let's move on. The last sentence is just begging for attention.

Actually, there's really not much I can say in terms of constructive criticism. This sentence is just bad -- really, really bad: "worthy citizens in our American society of representative democracy." Someone actually wrote that without the intention of sounding like a complete ass. And then someone else read it, apparently found nothing wrong with it, and published it on the Internet for the whole world to see. Amazing.

Are there no English teachers at that school anymore? There were two when I was there. Forget English teachers. Are there no native English speakers? And before you criticize me for being too harsh, remember, this is a school. A school! Where children go to learn how to use the English language like intelligent [expletive] people, not like bumbling [same expletive] idiots. You can do better than that, ACS. And if you can't, just close up shop now before you tarnish any more brains.

Medicare for All

I looked at all the democratic candidates' websites. The only one who has a plan for a single payer health care system is Dennis Kucinich. He is also the only one who has health care at the top of his issues list. Yes, it is more important than the war because the current system kills more Americans in one year than the war ever will. All the other candidates have lame-o plans that would make health care "affordable" for all Americans or get insurance to the 40 million who don't have it. These people still don't get it. It's not a question of money. It's a basic human right. And when a politician proposes anything that is not a single payer system that guarantees free care for everyone for everything they need, he is essentially saying that we Americans are not entitled to the same human rights as, say, the French or the Canadians. Seriously, when was the last time you heard a politician giving a speech about the need for affordable access to police protection? How many Republicans are touting virtues of the free market in providing Americans with their choice of competing for-profit fire departments?

(By the way, in a previous post, I praised Ron Paul, but that was as a Republican, not as a candidate. Republicans are one of two things: grossly misinformed or just plain evil. I think Ron Paul is just misinformed, but that doesn't mean I think he should be President.)

SiCKO

I saw Michael Moore's new movie SiCKO. If you're not in the States now but you're planning on going back, wait till you get there before watching it. You might not want to go back if you don't.

The movie is very good. Much more mature than his other films. I'm sure it has the half-truths and the cherry-picking problems his other movies have, but the premise is something I've known for a while: the American health care system is shameful. It's shameful and it's dangerous and I'm concerned about trusting my family to it.

Here's a list of the countries that have better systems than the United States, according to the World Health Organization (2000):
1 France
2 Italy
3 San Marino
4 Andorra
5 Malta
6 Singapore
7 Spain
8 Oman
9 Austria
10 Japan
11 Norway
12 Portugal
13 Monaco
14 Greece
15 Iceland
16 Luxembourg
17 Netherlands
18 United Kingdom
19 Ireland
20 Switzerland
21 Belgium
22 Colombia
23 Sweden
24 Cyprus
25 Germany
26 Saudi Arabia
27 United Arab Emirates
28 Israel
29 Morocco
30 Canada
31 Finland
32 Australia
33 Chile
34 Denmark
35 Dominica
36 Costa Rica

I've some thinking to do.

New York Times: News You Already Know

Extry! Extry! Read all about it! New York Times takes well known societal condition and passes it off as neeeews!

I chuckled when I saw this headline mixed in with actual news:
New Poll Finds That Young Americans Are Leaning Left

I don't what's lamer -- that they conducted such a stupidly obvious poll, or that they wasted even more time, money, and black ink "informing" the world of the results.

Tomorrow's front page headline: New Poll Finds That American Men Like Breasts... a Lot

Jesusland

Here are the lyrics to a song by NOFX called Leaving Jesusland. I've been told the part of Illinois I'll be moving to this summer is a solid part of the Bible Belt. Hopefully, the presence of a large and prestigious university will dull the effect, but I'm not too confident.

We call the heartland not very smart land, IQs are very low but threat levels are high
They got a mandate, they don't want man-dates, they got so many hates and people to despise

In the dust bowl, cerebral black hole, the average weight is well over 200 pounds
I hate to generalize, but have you seen their thighs, most haven't seen their genitalia in a while

Maybe that's why they're so scared of us
We've concerns other than fear of hunger pangs

Queers, transgends, and lesbians, vegans and vegetarians
All you brownish red and yellow ones come and join us on the coast

No longer svelte, they gotta punch new holes in the Bible belt
They've blown out the fire under the melting pot, the red blood of America is starting to clot
No compromise, no sight through others' eyes, they're just flies spreading pieces of shit
You gotta emigrate, stop living in hate, what makes this country great is dwelling on either side

They don't want visitors in Jesusland
They want life canned and bland in the Fatherland

We want people with college degrees, drug use experience and STDs
People with open-minded philosophies, come hug California trees
Cultural revolution now, neo-conservatives run outta town
We're gonna burn Orange County down,
And then we're off to Riverside, Bakersfield and Fresno too, then we're coming after you

The fear stricken, born again Christian, they got a vision a homogenized state
Textbook decline, intelligent design
They got Bill Nye on the list to execrate

They don't want visitors in Jesusland
They want life canned and bland in the fatherland

Punk Rockers and emo kids, people doing things the church forbids
Buddhists, agnostics, and atheists we're moving out of jesusland
Art students and thespians, excluding country, all the musicians
We want all hookers and comedians, nihilists are welcome too

No longer svelte, they gotta punch new holes in the Bible belt

Somebody please tell the president that grown-ups are alive, too.

"If this legislation became law, it would compel American taxpayers for the first time in our history to support the deliberate destruction of human embryos. I will not allow our nation to cross this moral line."

That was President Bush's justification for his latest veto of an embryonic stem cell research funding bill. What about the the deliberate destruction of human children and adults? American taxpayers have been compelled throughout our history to fund wars that kill thousands and thousands of civilians, most of them as "innocent" as an embryo. You could argue this killing is not deliberate, only "collateral damage," but since such killings are inevitable in war, anyone who engages in war is, if not deliberately killing, at least knowingly causing it. Why is this form of killing acceptable whereas the killing of embryos crosses a "moral line"? Despite what some talking heads will tell you, war is not a necessary evil. Ask Switzerland. Ask Costa Rica. Ask post-war Japan. Much of the world has outgrown our species' barbaric past. We haven't. And yet, our leaders presume to assume moral superiority on issues of life and death, all along ignoring the likelihood that stem cell research could produce treatments for diseases that kill thousands every year.

I'm not suggesting that it's OK to destroy embryos. Maybe it's not. Maybe it does cross a moral line. I'll give you that. But I would suggest that the killing of a hundred thousand Iraqi civilians also crosses that line. So if you're going to play the sanctity-of-life card, please, for the sake of my sanity, at least clean the blood of your hands first. You're getting the cards all dirty.

Hello Baby

Look at what we made.
Link

Are you a Republican?

First, the formalities: I forgive you. Say five Hail Marys and read the Constitution. Now, on to business...

I've always said, I never met a Texan I didn't dislike. Well, that has changed. I like Ron Paul. He's a Republican from Texas, but he's a good guy. No, seriously. No, really, I mean it. Check out his website. If you're a Republican, vote for him in the primaries. Why? Hmmm... how to appeal to a Republican? Ah! He wants to abolish the IRS. Forget the Republicans. That'll appeal to just about everyone. Now you know why I like him, too.

I want to be the least incomepent when I grow up.

"With a curve, the 'best and brightest' might actually be just the least incompetent of the incompetent. (But don't tell them that.)" - Atticus Falcon, Planet Law School II

No more phony doctors, please.

I'm taking back the word doctor for all the real doctors in the world. When I heard Christopher Hitchens call Karl Rove, who never even graduated from college, "Dr. Rove," watch I realized something had to be done.

The is what a doctor is: a person skilled or specializing in healing arts; especially : one (as a physician, dentist, or veterinarian) who holds an advanced degree and is licensed to practice. (www.m-w.com) Admittedly, every dictionary also defines doctor as someone who holds a doctorate. But it's time for that nonsense to end. Ph.D.s, J.D.s, and Ed.D.s are whatever they are -- usually researchers, lawyers, and educators, respectively -- but they, not to mention uneducated devil-spawn like Karl Rove, are not doctors. Stop calling them that. You can call coaches "Coach" and professors "Professor" and senators "Senator," but please, don't call them "Doctor." Save that for the, ahem, doctors. If you don't, I'm going to demand you start calling me Bachelor Sibble, and my wife won't like that.

The Yankees ... (sigh)

I have to say something about this. I've long said that no one can break my heart like the Yankees. Being a Yankee fan is tough. When I go to a baseball game here in Hiroshima, I of course root for the home team. It's exciting when they win and a bummer when they lose, but no one here expects them to win every game, let alone the championship. And what I mean by "expects" here is not "predicts" or "thinks," but rather "demands." Yankee fans demand victory. There is no other way. Maybe I could enjoy this terrible season a little more if I could actually watch the games, but here in Japan, I only get highlight reels and up-to-the-minute scores. And when the news is always bad, it's not fun. The Yankees have lost four in-a-row, and are 3.5 game below .500. If you don't know what that means, just know that it doesn't cheer me up when I'm feeling homesick.

Yay! I'm not a militant.

You scored as Scientific Atheist, These guys rule. I'm not one of them myself, although I play one online. They know the rules of debate, the Laws of Thermodynamics, and can explain evolution in fifty words or less. More concerned with how things ARE than how they should be, these are the people who will bring us into the future. Scientific Atheist 75% Apathetic Atheist 67% Spiritual Atheist 50% Angry Atheist 42% Militant Atheist 33% Agnostic 17% Theist 17% What kind of atheist are you? created with QuizFarm.com

Please post your results in the comments section of this thread.

Medieval Dentist

I had visit number three of my second root canal treatment today. My dentist is hardcore, man. He does the whole procedure with no anesthetic. I know. That sounds either impossible or extremely painful, doesn't it? Well, let me assure you, it's not impossible. Also, because of this, it takes like half-a-dozen visits. He drills into the tooth until he hits the nerve (yes, this hurts a lot), then injects the tooth with some drug that's supposed to "kill" the nerve. It doesn't do a very good job, especially when it comes to drilling out the actual root canals, which is what I went through today. If you drill deep enough, eventually, you will find some living nerve. That's what happened today... on all four roots. Not a good time.

The misspelling I hate the most...

... is definitely "definately." GAH!

I can forgive most misspellings. Let's face it: English spelling is hard. Rules are hard to remember and nearly all of them have exceptions. And some exceptions themselves have exceptions: 'I' before 'E' except after 'C' except when said 'ay' as in 'neighbor' or 'weigh'... except, of course, for 'seize' and a long list of other exceptions. Not such a useful rule. Anyway, my real beef with the "definately" crowd is that most of them wouldn't misspell any of the simpler forms from which this word is derived. Look.

Einstein wasn't sure the universe is FINATE. (No.)

There's a DEFINATE smell of cheese in this room. (Looks like a bodily function.)

Yet, tack on a 'ly', the brain goes into long-words-are-too-hard-for-me mode, and suddenly DEFINATELY looks A-OK. Eww, bad pun. Sorry.

So, if you suffer from this most unforgivable of spelling errors, check out this website. If that doesn't cure you, you might consider buying one of these to serve as a reminder. (I might just get one to show off my Grammar Nazism.)

So, until next time, remember, Spell Check Saves Lives.

Scientology and an Angry British Journalist

Just in case you were thinking of giving the Church of Scientology any undue respect, watch this episode of Panorama, an affairs programme on the BBC. Did the British dude's tantrum remind anyone else of Steve Ballmer's Monkey Dance? Well... without the dancing, of course.

The devil made him do it.

A teenage father from Texas, looking for work as a preacher (Not a good start, is it?) cooked his baby in a hotel microwave. She survived. Now Mommy wants the little girl back because, in her words, "He would never do anything to hurt her." Blame the devil. Ah, Satan: the righteous' scapegoat since 30 A.D.

Now, if a holy man wants to get high on meth and have a romp in the abominable hay with a male prostitute (a la Ted Haggard), that's fine with me. I won't judge you. Sounds like a good time for all. And it helps the economy. But cooking babies. I'm afraid I'm going to have to draw the line there. There's something seriously wrong with Texan Christianity. First, George Bush, now this? Ugh.

Two things

I watched The Paper Chase today. It seems to be required watching for all would-be law students. It was good. Professor Kingsfield wasn't nearly as scary as I've heard. Perhaps I've successfully prepared myself for the horrors of the Socratic method, and have become pre-desensitized. Nevertheless, I don't imagine I'll be cucumber cool the first time I'm humiliated in front of 60 other students who get off on seeing each other fail.

Numero dos: I've decided to sleep for eight hours every night. 10-6. Maybe 12-8 once school starts, but for now, I like 10-6.

When showing up is good enough / Goodbye CNN

No, I'm not talking about my job!! Paris Hilton, amateur porn starlet, got her jail sentence cut in half for "good behavior." Apparently, jail officials weren't expecting her to show up for her court date, so when she did, it made a good impression. Link

In a related story, I am officially abandoning CNN.com for BBC News as my main news source.

Turtle Butt

Finally, I can say it was all worth it. After two years in Japan, I can at least go home with no regrets. Sure, I got married and will be a father in less than two months, but this is big.

I have a student... in elementary school... and his name... is Turtle Butt. Well, that sounds a bit too much like the name of a Native American in some tasteless jokes I've heard. Actually, his name is Kouta Kamejiri. Kouta is his first name. Who knows what it means. It doesn't matter. The last name is what we're looking at here. Kamejiri. Kame means turtle or tortoise, and shiri means ass or butt. Put them together, a little Japanese phonetics turns the "sh" to "j," and there it is: Kamejiri. Turtle-butt.

I wonder if the Japanese find this as hilarious as I do. Probably not. They're totally obsessed with character meaning when it comes to first names. [Trust me, I know this all too well. My wife and I had decided on a name for our baby, and then she started having second thoughts because she couldn't find a character she liked. Meh.] Half the boys in Japan have the character for big and strong in their name. But when it comes to last names, like Turtle-butt, no one seems to think about the meaning. In fact, I've joked with people about the meaning of their names and they say, "No, no, there's no meaning. Just a name." Sure. Maybe if the characters meant something more exotic than "Moat Field" (my wife's name) or "Mountain Mouth," they'd be a little more forthcoming. When your name means "In the middle of the field" (Nakada), it's not hard to tell what your ancestors did for a living (hint: they weren't samurai).

I did a web search for Turtle-butt in Japanese to see how common a name it is. 12,800 hits. Sibble had about 18,000. Must not be very common. I have a feeling it's a hilarious name, even in Japanese, and I'm glad I found it before I left Japan.

I have ITBS

Iliotibial band syndrome, that is. It's a common ailment among runners. I've been running a lot recently. Apparently, it was too much. I found a nice, 10-mile loop near my house that goes through a golf course and over a mountain. I believe I mentioned it before. Anyway, I guess the mileage, my old shoes, and/or the mountain have not been good to my iliotibial bands. There's a fair amount of pain where they attach to my tibiae. I have to start a stretching regimen before I can run again, and then only for short distances on flat ground. Of course, I'll have to find some flat ground first.

Tokyo!

The first step to getting an American immigrant visa is to have a citizen petition on your behalf. That's me, and I had to go to Tokyo to do it. One of the things I really dislike about Japan is the disproportionately expensive transportation costs. Everything is too expensive here, but nothing compares to the costs of simply getting around. Airplanes and shinkansen (high speed bullet trains) are justifiably costly, but what really blisters my paint is the highway system. I understand. It's the mountains. There are tunnels every couple of miles of every highway in Japan, and that's gotta cost a lot, but it should not cost $200 in tolls to drive from Hiroshima to Tokyo. That's just wrong. And it's the main reason the buses, while by far the cheapest method of travel, are also too expensive (a little over $200 r/t). Imagine driving from New York to Chicago and paying $200 in tolls. Gah.
Sure, there are surface streets, but driving any great distance on them is worse than trying to get through New Jersey without using the Turnpike. Traffic lights every few hundred meters. I took the bus.

Anyway, I took some pictures while I was there. Enjoy.

You're a chef??

I found out yesterday my wife is a chef. Well, not really. She trained to be a chef and has a piece of paper somewhere that attests to that fact, but she hasn't worked as a one in quite some time. Nevertheless, I am enjoying the benefits of having a trained food service professional in the family.

I wonder what I'll find out next...

Pooped.

What a day. I ran over a mountain, through a golf course, through a valley, and back over another mountain. Then Etsuko and I went to the city to see a monkey show and her favorite singer. Between shows we hit her favorite temple. It was quite a sight. I spent about five minutes taking photos of the entrance before I realized there was a whole lot more to go. I'll have to go back and get some more shots someday.

The decision are in, sort of...

I received the last of the law school decision letters yesterday. Here are the full results of the whole admissions process, which I started way back in November. (The numbers in parentheses are the 2007 US News & World Report Rankings.)

(13) Cornell - rejected
(14) Georgetown - rejected
(22) George Washingtong - waitlist
(25) Fordham - rejected
(25) Illinois - accepted
(28) U of Washington - rejected
(31) William and Mary - waitlist
(31) Wisconsin - waitlist
(34) George Mason - accepted
(52) Cardozo - waitlist
(60) Brooklyn - waitlist
(91) Santa Clara - accepted

All the waitlistings are a bit annoying, but understandable. "You're LSAT was good, but we'd like to wait and see if someone with a higher GPA wants your seat before we let you in." I'm not sure why Illinois was so quick to accept me and even offer me a scholarship. I guess being situated in the middle of the world's biggest cornfield makes recruitment difficult.

Sushi!

I got my hair cut today. Then Etsuko and I went to kaiten-zushi! Yahoo! Kaiten-zushi is one of the things I'll miss the most about Japan. Sure, there's sushi in the States, but it doesn't rotate around the shop on a conveyor belt. Take a look at what you're missing.

It's just stories.

I had this in my IM profile for a while. Joe liked it, so I'll share it with the world.

I was trying to explain to my wife the problem of Christian fundamentalism in America, in particular the efforts to install like-minded politicians into positions of power (like president) in order to reverse centuries of social and scientific progress. I told her the Judeo-Christian creation story and related it to the fight against teaching evolution, but she looked puzzled. So, I suggested she think of the Shinto creation myth, in which it is said that the god Izanagi and the goddess Izanami churned the sea with a jewel-encrusted spear, forming the islands of Japan from the drops of sea water that fell from the tip. She nodded, and then paused. Then she looked at me and said, in the way that you say something that is so obvious you're embarrassed you have to say it: "But it's just stories."

I ate too much candy today.

I am debating whether or not to re-activate my .mac account. I would really like to. I just don't have a credit card now. My account was sold to some other bank, I never got my new card, so now I've got no credit card and I still have to pay my bills. Anyway, I'll give this blogspot thing a whirl in the meantime. I've also put some photos up on picasa if you're interested.