Bill's Notes

Here's an outstanding article on the reaction in some quarters of the Jewish community to Mel Gibson's movie on the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. I've seen the trailer and found the scenes incredibly powerful. I am really looking forward to Gibson's film.

At the same time, I was disappointed at the reaction of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and other members of the Jewish community. The reaction seemed to indicate that Christians are so much the bigoted dolts that they'll be beating Jews in the street after viewing the movie. Two thoughts: (1) Screw you for the condescension. (2) Screw you for attempting to interfere with the director while he's producing the film.

Rabbi Daniel Lapin in the above link pretty much dismantles the reaction. Good for him. And thanks.

John Derbyshire claims to be having a good time in Alabama, specifically Montgomery. Now that's a little weird.

Now I've been to Montgomery. Wasn't impressed. In a battle with Trenton as the dullest, most burned-out industrial, most culturally wasted state capital, it would barely be edged out by Trenton.

And the city is set in the midst of a dull, flat, muddy expanse of kudzu-covered flatland whose monotony is only relieved by the nasal-piercing stench of paper mills. About as exciting as the Pine Barrens, but stinkier.

Derbyshire, you can move to 'bama and keep it. And Tuscaloosa? That U of A surrounded by nondescript spawl except for an dingy southern town.

The only things worth a damn in Alabama are Mobile Bay and the coast. The rest we could use as a reservation for people with no taste.

The test results came back today for Patrick, the cocker spaniel who's been such a good companion to Jen and I for these past four years. Patrick has cancer. There are no real options for chemo or surgery. So he's on homeopathic treatments. We'll try to make his remaining time as pleasant as possible for him. It's very sad.

Among Patrick's claims to fame over the years:

1. Diving into any puddle, river or lake he can find. He's a natural water dog and always seems to want to cool off. In one park, he dove into this green muck and just thought it was the greatest thing.

2. Trying (without much success) to intimidate Cinnamon, a horse who used to live up the street. On many occasions, Patrick gave the old pull the leash, bark and rush treatment to the horse, who remain unfazed.

3. Simply coming with us without much fanfare when we picked him up at the foster home. He just hopped in the car and didn't look back.

4. On several occasions, fetching a tennis ball and dropping it at my feet. But he'd only do it once or twice.

5. Fighting for dominance for a good six weeks with a dog 15 to 20 pounds heavier than he. Jake, a hound, eventually wore Patrick down, but Patrick earned everyone's respect for his spirit.

6. Hopping up on the kitchen table and eating an entire bowl of salsa during a party at Jen's.

On the other hand, Patrick was a pretty compulsive dog, had pretty bad food allergies, and never stopped pulling on a leash ... but was happy for years.

I'll stop here. He's got some time left.

One addition: Whew! I'm glad the larger Ninth Circuit panel came to its senses.

While I'm against the recall itself, I'm more against canceling elections after they've started. And I really don't like federal courts staying state elections.

Frankly, I was a little shocked at the ACLU. They actually tried to stop an election during the campaign. Wow! What happened to these guys?

As is all over the news, an en banc panel of Ninth Circuit justices has allowed the California recall to go forward. One thing I've noticed in the news stories is the terminology isn't always clear, and many people must be a bit confused. Let me see if I can explain.

The federal court system has three tiers: district courts, circuit courts, and the U.S. Supreme Court.

The district courts are the initial entry point for all federal cases. They handle trials, motions, etc., concerning federal matters. If one or another party to a district court proceeding doesn't like the result of a district court ruling, the party may appeal to the circuit court.

There are 13 U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Twelve of these circuits are geographic in jurisdiction; that is, they have jurisdiction over almost all the cases that come out of all district courts in certain states. For example, the Ninth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals has jurisdiction over all the federal district courts in Washington, Alaska, Hawaii, Oregon, California, Montana, Idaho, Nevada and Idaho. The 13th court, called the Federal Circuit, handles patent and trademark cases from anywhere in the U.S.

In each of these circuits there are anything from under a dozen to nearly 30 judges. When an appeal is accepted from a district court, a panel of three of those judges will hear the appeal and make a ruling. If a party to a case doesn't like a ruling, the party can appeal one of two ways:
(1) they can petition the U.S. Supreme Court — but only on constitutional grounds, or
(2) they can appeal to the same circuit court for a larger panel, called an en banc panel, of randomly chosen justices, to hear the appeal.

A party will choose the latter opinion when it believes the three-judge panel has erred and want to make the substantially the same arguments to a different group of judges. See, they can only appeal a decision to the U.S. Supreme Court on constitutional grounds. But if the party thinks the panel blew the decision on the law, then it asks the appeals court to hear the case with a larger group of judges, which is called an en banc panel.

This last kind of appeal is what happened in the California recall case. The appeals panel of three justices reversed the district court, but made a decision that the other justices simply thought was wrong. The arguments were made again, and though they were virtually the same arguments made before the smaller panel, this time there was a different result. On an 11-0 decision, the en banc panel reversed the three-judge panel.

See how it works?

Dean Esmay has an interesting discussion about the latest effort to ban Huck Finn in public schools. So it goes.

But that's not what I want to talk about. Any time anyone mentions Huck Finn, I think of the ending.

Lemme get this straight: Huck Finn, a kid, and Jim, a runaway slave, float down river on a raft. Fair enough. On the way, Huck discovers Jim's humanity. Fair enough. But there's something wrong. They're hoping to escape, but they're going the wrong way on the river. They're headed straight into slave territory.

How is this resolved? In the heart of the south, another kid, Tom Sawyer, shows up deux ex machina with papers freeing Jim. Which all the folks down in Louisiana just accept and let 'em all go back home. High fives all around.

Yeah, that's what happened, Huck. You killed a man to get Jim home, didn't you?

Recent packing and unpacking of my apartment churned up my belongings and brought some strange things to the surface. One, for example, was a milk crate full of short stories I wrote 12 years ago in grad school. Oh my my. Oh my. I am so glad nothing ever was sent for publication.

One irony: During my creative writing program, I was frustrated by what I perceived as a lack of guidance by my professors about how to improve my writing, and that they were unduly harsh on my writing because they didn't like my writing style.

Well, I found myself reading a short story that I remember years ago thinking was good — a little rough in spots, but overall pretty good. So I'm sitting among my unpacked stuff and reading it and thinking, my God, what bloody drivel. It's not even crap, it's drivel. Then, in the margins of the story, there are comments from my professor. The comments are kind. The comments are understated. And the comments correctly diagnose the problem. Yikes!

This kind of stuff scares me. If my memory of the events is that out of touch with, well, how it clearly appears now, then what about the memories of things that I didn't write down? Can I see any of the past clearly?

And how do I know I'm seeing things any better now? Am I that out to lunch when it comes to reality?

Or is this kind of thing just a normal part of life?

... maybe it should be. I pulled the cable TV out of my apartment about 10 months ago. Sure, there was a small gap for a while, but now I don't miss it at all.

But let me tell you, this weekend over a friends' house I watched a little television. From what I could tell, TV now consists of mostly celebrity worship, cheesy movies and sitcoms geared for adolescents. Current television makes Bachelor Party (the 80s flick with Tom Hanks where the donkey overdoses) as high culture.

Fortunately, there's always the Internet. Especially this blog. Please send comments to industrialblog [at] hotmail [dot] com for more highbrow entertainment. Or at least middlebrow and acceptable low-brow entertainment.

Back in college, I knew a bunch of guys who wagered considerably over the course of several football seasons. Each one of them concluded before long that the NFL is fixed. I recall one game where a team drove near the end of a game and kicked a meaningless field goal with less than a minute left. The only significance of the field goal was it meant the team beat the spread. Considerable howling at the unfairness of it all.

Me — I concluded that they didn't really understand probability. Yet, very weird last NFL week. Green Bay and SF losing outright — and a bunch of other close games where the loser covers the spread.

A sage once wrote that politicians have all the qualities of dogs except loyalty. Not only was it a shrewd observation about politicians, it was a shrewd observation about dogs. It is surely dogs' loyalty that is their most outstanding quality.

So we turn to our cocker spaniel friend Patrick, who is somewhere between seven and nine, and has been stricken. Patrick is probably the most independent dog I've ever seen. He's got a bit of cat in him that way. But he's as loyal as any dog I've seen.

Still, he's a dog. After surgery, he spent Friday night and most of Saturday lying in a little bed we made for him — an open crate filled with towels — shaking off the effects of being cut open. He didn't respond much to our voices. But suddenly, around three Saturday afternoon, Jen went to give her other dog a biscuit.

Now, the biscuits are in a ceramic jar and removing the lid makes a sound. you can guess the rest. Jen opened the jar, and the dog, who couldn't quite stand yet, heard the scraping sound. He poked his head up and looked over at the jar very purposefully. Aah, he's back, we thought. (He got his biscuit of course.)

By the evening, he was up and around. And during the night he managed to leave his crate and sneak up the stairs. Beginnings of mischief, no doubt.

We should get test results in a week.