“Film School Follies: Part 1 – Seminole and Void”

Today we start a series written by loyal Commentarama reader ScottDS about his adventures in film school.

By ScottDS
Let us flashback to the mid-90s. The Discovery Channel used to air a weekly documentary series titled Movie Magic in which we were given the opportunity to witness the various exploits of cinema's visual effects wizards. (The DVD format, replete with its requisite “making-of featurettes” was still a few years away.)

Each episode would cover one specific topic: bluescreen photography, matte painting, models, make-up effects, etc. They would usually analyze the effects for one or two current films, and then explain the history of those effects using footage from older films. In one episode, they showcased a group of student filmmakers crashing an airplane model into a miniature desert landscape, à la Flight of the Phoenix. Those students were film majors at… Florida State University! (sorry, Gators)

My reaction was something along the lines of, “Florida?! I live in Florida!”

Sometime in the sixth grade, I realized I wanted to work in the film business. I sort of segued from production design, to visual effects (I even received a letter from George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic with a list of recommended schools), to directing. Why directing? At the time I figured that, as director, the success or failure of a film would fall on my shoulders. As a set designer or visual effects artisan, I would have no control over the story content of the film itself but, as director, I would. In retrospect, I don't know what the hell I was thinking! Unlike Spielberg, I didn't come out of the womb wielding a Panaflex. I never had a lot of friends, let alone friends that would help me make movies, and I was shy to a debilitating degree.

But I was always interested. I read various film publications, watched all the documentaries I could, but I never shot anything of my own. When it came time to choose a college, I chose FSU. They had this film program and, due to financial considerations, I was forced to stay in the state. Now let me talk to you about that process: at the time, FSU's film school was highly selective; it’s probably worse now. They would take fifteen freshman and fifteen transfers. If I failed to gain admittance as a freshman, I could still go, take my core classes, and get in as a transfer student. I knew the odds were against me from minute one but I had to try, right? I mean, that's what all high school seniors do – they apply to college, and three months after high school ends, they're off and away. (I probably would’ve been better off backpacking through Europe or joining the Peace Corps instead!)

Just to show you how efficient the system was, I applied to FSU online and before I even knew what had happened, I was presented with the “Congratulations! Mail us a check for $25 and your application will be processed!” screen. I did it? There's an entire subgenre of instructional literature based on getting into college and I just did it? (Of course, all I had done was apply; getting in was another story.) In December of 2000, I received my acceptance letter… and I might still have it somewhere! I did not get into the film school but I was officially a Seminole. My family was proud of me and I suppose that's all I ever wanted from them.

Here's the deal: to better your chances of getting into the film school, you had to “make yourself known” meaning take film classes, work on student films, network, the usual. I worked as a production assistant (PA) on a short film titled Homerun, which appeared to be an old-fashioned “ragtag bunch of baseball players win one for home” story. I posted my info on the film school bulletin board (not online, but a real bulletin board!) and someone – probably the producer, I don't remember – called me a day or two later and asked if I'd be interested in working on their little opus. After staying up entirely too late the night before (watching Dr. Strangelove – the ending somewhat paralleling my year at FSU), I got up at the crack of dawn and trudged from my Dante's Inferno of a dorm down to the film building. No one home, of course. Eventually someone saw me and we were off to a local park. I helped where I could: setting up craft services (catering), distributing walkie-talkies, handling paperwork, etc. When you're a PA it is absolutely important that you have something to do. Even if you don't. I once read somewhere that, if you have zero to do, get a rag and start cleaning up a table. At least you're doing something!

My job for the day: human roadblock. That’s right, I was given a walkie and an orange vest and was told to block traffic whenever they were shooting… which was often. (The sound of the passing cars interfered with the audio.) The assistant director would chime in with “Lock it down!” and I'd have to stand in the middle of the street (only two lanes, thank God) and hold up my stop sign. On “Cut!”, I'd retreat back to land. What a miserable day! I've since learned to keep things in perspective. I was not in the Middle East dismantling IEDs. I was not a firefighter putting out a ten-story blaze. I was just a PA, formerly referred to as a “gopher” and by John Landis as a “schlepper.” (As a teenager, Landis worked as a PA behind the Iron Curtain before going on to direct such classic films as Animal House, The Blues Brothers, and Trading Places.)

I was about a hundred feet from where they were shooting so I couldn't hear much in terms of dialogue. I was able to stop a few cars but a couple managed to get through the “formidable blockade” I presented. No harm done. At the end of the day, people thanked me for my help (student and indie filmmakers are truly grateful for all the [free] help they can get) and I was driven back to school where I went back to my dorm and collapsed. I finally saw the film months later… on a three inch black and white monitor with no sound in a dubbing room deep within the bowels of the film building. It looked okay from where I was sitting!

But that's not all. I took two film classes. The first class (the name escapes me and I trashed all my FSU paperwork a couple years ago) was a pure exercise in boredom. The textbook consisted of microscopic print from cover to cover with no visual aids and I can’t even recall if it had an index or a glossary. It was quite user-unfriendly and full of ten-dollar words. I’m not saying the book should’ve been dumbed down; it was simply poorly designed. It was in this class that I realized something: “Are we reading too much into things?” When the teacher would talk about the beauty of a particular shot, I would always ask myself, “What if that was the only place they could put the camera?” Don’t get me wrong – I want to appreciate this sort of thing but my brain seems to value practical considerations over the aesthetic.

The other class was titled “President's Seminar on Film” and it was taught by one of the higher-ups in the film school. It was a weekly roundtable discussion. Each student was assigned a film to present; we'd view the film, and then talk about it – simple as that. I really should’ve asked out the cute girl who, after a screening of Do the Right Thing blurted out, “I think Spike Lee is a racist, egotistical asshole!” Naturally my presentation fell on September 11th and since classes were cancelled, I had to present something else later. (The film I was to introduce happened to be a personal favorite of mine, Who Framed Roger Rabbit. I ended up introducing a couple of Wallace & Gromit shorts on the last day of class instead.)

We were also assigned a report: ten pages on a film of our choosing. Ninety pages later, I had my paper on Kevin Smith's Clerks. Truth be told, most of the material came from Smith’s interview in Stephen Lowenstein's book, My First Movie. One girl eyed the report sticking out of my bag as if it were the chestburster from Alien. The teacher, on the other hand, was impressed. Not enough to get me into the film school. Sometime in early 2002, I received my official rejection letter (which I plan on showing at any future awards ceremony I'm invited to).

At the end of the day, there are no wasted experiences, only disappointments. FSU was a big disappointment. The highlights were the free movies in the Student Life Theater and the Krispy Kreme case in the convenience store. I managed to make a couple friends that I try to keep in touch with (one joined the Peace Corps, the other joined the Navy) but other than that, it's a distant memory. I left FSU in the spring of 2002 and I haven't been back since. On one hand, “Good riddance!” On the other hand, I've always wondered what would've happened if I had stayed there and majored in something else.

Another thing I noticed and I'm sure this applies to other professions as well. Whenever I would spend time in the film building, everyone just seemed so insular. It was as if they didn't want anyone trespassing on their turf. I would overhear the geekiest conversations but who was I to barge in and offer my own two cents? And I've always walked that line between full tilt geeky and the need for a more “normal” life (which is quite paradoxical since no one would accuse me of being a well-rounded guy!). Some of these people lived, ate, drank, and slept film and when they weren't shooting, they were writing or editing. I couldn't do that. I still can't. A friend of a friend got into the film school and went on to win a Student Academy Award. I look at photos of him and his cute (film geek) girlfriend and I think to myself, “That's me in a parallel universe where I'm less lazy and more courageous.”

In my next article, I'll introduce you to Full Sail University where laziness and courage seemed to go hand in hand.

Recommended Reading:

(I’ll be including books and periodicals about various aspects of the film industry.)

Lowenstein, Stephen. My First Movie: Twenty Celebrated Directors Talk about Their First Film. New York: Pantheon Books, 2000.

Rickitt, Richard. Special Effects: The History and Technique. New York: Billboard Books, 2000.

Smith, Thomas G. Industrial Light & Magic: The Art of Special Effects. New York: Ballantine Books, 1988.

Vaz, Mark Cotta and Patricia Rose Duignan. Industrial Light & Magic: Into the Digital Realm. New York: Ballantine Books, 1996.

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Gadhafi Carol

Today, I’m going to be a little lazy. I seem to be suffering the effects of the Lawyer Flu (H1N2). Unlike the H1N1, which will kill us all, this one only annoys the heck out of you. In the final stage, I hear it sues your colon, but I don’t know about that yet.

Since I’m being lazy, I’m just going to re-print something interesting I read. I figured you could all stand to learn a little more about our friend Moammar Gadhafi. Enjoy. . .

AP -- New York

In his long and dramatic address to the UN today, Libyan leader and noted Swiss-hater, Moammar Gadhafi aired various eyebrow-raising complaints. Among his targets:

• The UN Security Council, which he called the “Terror Council” for failing to prevent conflicts around the world since 1945, including his own coup in Libya.

• Everyone who says he looks like Michael Jackson.

• Switzerland, because he’s lactose intolerant.

• The premier of China, who keeps saying “nice dress” whenever he sees Gadhafi.

• The UN delegation from Kongo Bora, who keep calling him Gadhafi Duck.

• New York. He wants the UN moved from New York because New York is an inconvenient location for him and it causes him to suffer from jetlag. He also ranted for several minutes about the difficulties inherent in getting camels to board airplanes.

Gadhafi also whined about the Iraq war, which he described as the mother of all evils, and about General Mills, which sold him a box of Lucky Charms that contained the mother of all weevils.

He accused the Fed of being part of an international conspiracy to destroy the Libyan currency -- the Turd. He said that Oliver Stone killed JFK, who is not really dead, but instead lives on the moon deflating world oil prices. And he claimed that swine flu was some sort of plot by non-Arab governments, though he mumbled so badly that no one is sure exactly what he said.

At one point, he tossed the UN Charter fourteen feet across the floor, coming close to the record of fourteen feet three inches set by S'mdum Bastrd from Tossilvania. His throw was enough to place him second, however, just edging out the former Chancellor of East Germany.

Many have speculated as to what caused Gadhafi’s erratic behavior. Some suggest Gadhafi was upset from lack of rest. He had planned to set up his tent on Donald Trump’s property in Bedford, NY, home to Martha Stewart and Ralph Lauren, who also live in tents. But Trump wasn’t home or didn’t answer the doorbell when Gadhafi rang. So he ended up staying at a U-Store-It in Englewood, New Jersey, where he had no access to water or electricity, and he lacked the necessary southern view to get satellite television.

During the night, Gadhafi apparently also experienced difficulties when he was visited by three guests. First, came Louis Farrakhan, who discussed the past with Gadhafi, reminding him of how happy he was before he seized power. Then he was visited by two unknown young African American men in “Raiders” jackets, who showed him what life was like for average New Jersey residents, meaning they stole his tent and graffiti'd his camel. Finally, he was visited by a vagrant who spoke to him of the future, before sexually assaulting him. The vagrant has been charged with sexual assault on a foreign dignitary, which carries a penalty of three days in prison.

In any event, Gadhafi’s speech hasn’t gone unnoticed. As of this writing, most news organizations have reported on his erratic behavior. CNN called it “shockingly insulting,” CBS News referred to it as “Moammar’s Rant”, while MSNBC described it as “a brilliant tour de-force that continues to prove the evils of Bush administration policy.”

The White House had no comment on the content of the speech, though they did congratulate him on his second place finish in tossing the UN charter. They also promised to cut down the trees blocking his satellite view at the U-Store-It.

Tomorrow, Gadhafi plans to unleash a plague of locust at the UN, where he warns prophetically that they will destroy every crop in New York City, starving the people of Manhattan.

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San Francisco Diary--Journal Of An Exile

The beginning of the fall festivals is upon us. But San Francisco's are a bit different from what most of you are used to. A little more colorful, shall we say. September 23 through 26 is the celebration of what used to be a one-day "event." It's called the Folsom Street Fair. Sounds pretty wholesome, doesn't it? Flowers, colorful outfits, people enjoying family picnics. Well, that ain't it. The parade on Saturday is a gay, lesbian, whatever, leather and bondage fest, accompanied by public sex acts. It wouldn't play in Peoria.

Note: San Francisco Examiner Gay Nightlife writer Marques Daniels is positively atwitter about the whole thing. "This will be one of the most action packed, entertaining, and naughty weekends to hit San Francisco, Folsom Fair Weekend!" He was sure to point out that most of the events have porn star themes, and will have porn stars in the house partying all night. Some of the scheduled events at the various (and many) gay bars include: Go Go Boys Malik's Birthday Bash, Brain Farts Trivia, HUMP, Booty Call, Mary-Go-Round, Homecoming and Drag Debutantes, Lez Ladies Night, Pop Goes the Zipper, Leather Clad Papi Dancers, Wet Jock Strap Contest, and my personal favorite, the Dildo Ring Toss. And those are just the church-sponsored events.

Most exciting of all, Mario Cruz, famed star of stage, video and back alleys will be appearing for the events, participating in the show off your butt activities. He was recently voted "top bottom star of the year." Which organization honored him with the title is lost on me, but I suspect it wasn't the Catholic League. So if you come to San Francisco, be sure to wear some leather on your arse. In the streets of San Francisco, gonna be a porn-in there. The Folsom Street Parade and Fair actually occur, oddly enough, on Folsom Street. I suggest you detour somewhere near Fresno and attend the garlic festival in Gilroy instead. The Folsom Street Fair is not for the faint-hearted. Several years back my son and his then-girlfriend (now wife) were coming to visit me. I had completely forgotten about the Fair, so he had to come past Folsom Street to get to my side of town. It took a couple of weeks for the color to seep back into their faces and get their jaws back into their normal position.

Note: In the Chronicle today there was an open letter to Glenn Beck from Pike Drummond, CEO and founder of the Tides Foundation (not to be mistaken for Chief Funder of the Foundation, George Soros and his assistant, pickle princess Teresa Heinz Kerry). He was sarcastically thanking Beck for bringing considerable attention to the connections between Soros, the Tides Foundation, ACORN and Barack Obama. He specifically referred to the large number of phone inquiries that he received about Beck's excerpts taken from the Tides Foundation-funded video entitled "The Story of Stuff." It's a left-wing, agitprop, anti-capitalist, pro-socialist, green weenie piece of trash, slickly produced, which purports to teach children about responsible environmentalism. In its illustrations, it represents the government with a stylized military tank. Get it? The government is oppressing you.

It's impossible to describe the whole pathetic twenty-minute "instructional" tape. The narrator, Annie Leonard, says it's a story of "consumerism" which is destroying the planet, but she doesn't say that on the tape. Pike, of course, pooh-poohs the whole concept that the video is anything but the straight dope, professionally-presented, and completely fair--a proper educational piece. And there are plenty of dummies out there running schools who have taken his word for it. It's already been shown in over 22,000 schools nationwide. Drummond says Beck's exposure of the project has brought him over 25,000 calls inquiring about the tape. I'm not sure how many of those calls were favorable, but as he said "there's no such thing as bad publicity." I doubt he really means that, and I suspect there's a bit of bluster involved here.

But don't take Beck's (or my) word for it. If you want to see some of this propaganda that might show up in your kids' schools, go here: Story of Stuff. Be patient, it took me several times of getting "broken link" and "server not responding" before I got through. Or alternatively, just watch Beck's series on Fox News Channel. Drummond says it isn't true, but he comes up with nothing that Beck has said that he could point out as being untrue. I can tell you that it includes multiple citations of absolutely outrageous statistics that have zero basis is truth.

Note: Mayor Gavin Newsom has declared "soda is the new tobacco." Now that's supposed to mean that it's bad, or addictive, or something, and the gummint must immediately save us from it. What he really means is, "oh, boy, I've found another way to get tax money." Now Newsom's no dummy (he's nuts, but he's not a dummy). He knows he can't impose a direct tax on an individual product being sold in San Francisco without first getting a vote of the people. But where there's a tax-grabber, there's a way. He only needs the approval of the Board of Supervisors to impose a "fee" on retailers. And there's nothing they like more than a new tax, particularly when it's disguised as a fee. That way, when the price of a can of coke goes up to more than a can of caviar, the consumer will blame the retailer and not the city.

It's all part of his Shape Up San Francisco exercise program, which he intends to give the newfound money to. Now remember, San Francisco is skating on the thin edge of bankruptcy. When the City Attorney pointed out that the city would very likely be sued by every major retailer in town, Newsom responded: "But I really believe this is important to do." This latest move comes in the wake of a new UCLA study showing a link between soda and obesity. They needed to do a study to figure that out? I could have told them that, for free.

The "fee" will not apply in restaurants or fast food outlets. So instead of going to Safeway to get their drug, the little fatties will have to go to McDonald's or Burger King. Of course Newsom is trying to steal President Obama's thunder. One of the many ways proposed to pay for our fantastic universal health care is to tax soda nationwide, so we'll be a nation of razor-thin non-smokers (except for the guys who are going to get rich off the tobacco and soda black market). Even in San Francisco there is a growing sense of unease about the nanny state being created by Newsom and the Dwarves. In the past few years, the city has banned the sale of cigarettes in any store which has a pharmacy, added a city tax to the price of a pack of cigarettes, required chain restaurants to display calories and fat content on menus, and created a program to recognize restaurants that don't serve trans fats.

Most experts have said that the increase in the price of a single can of soda won't be sufficient to dissuade anyone from buying one, but is in reality just another way to raise money for worthless projects to make leftist politicians look like they're doing something important. Meanwhile, the violent crime rate is still throught the roof, the city's infrastructure is crumbling faster than Nancy Pelosi's makeup, and the streets are filthy. But hey, there will be fewer fat people, or so says hizzoner.

Note: Not to be outdone by San Francisco's efforts to tell you what's right, San Jose has just passed the strictest shopping bag ordinance in the nation. Plastic bags are now completely verboten in grocery stores. As for paper bags, they can only be used by the stores if they are at least 40 percent recycled materials, and they cannot be given out free with the groceries. The ordinance cannot go into effect until it has passed an environmental review and a legal analysis (I'll give you that, it's bloody unconstitutional). But considering these will be the same authorities who think delta smelt are worth more than human beings, I think I know the result in advance.

Note: The militant Islamists have found a friend. On Wednesday, a federal judge sitting in San Francisco (where else?) has allowed a defunct Islamic "charity" to sue the government for what it alleges was an illegal wiretap. The Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation was declared a terrorist organization in 2004. The jihadists have been searching since 2006 to find a judge anywhere in the Ninth Circuit who would allow the suit to go forward. I could have saved them the time. File the action in San Francisco, they love terrorists. The group was headquartered in Oregon, so they must have worked their way down the coast, stopping at federal courthouses on the way.

This is only the second time any judge anywhere in the nation has allowed such a suit to survive a demurrer (a formal motion to dismiss a case for failure to state a cause of action upon which relief can be granted). In the first case there was at least clear and convincing evidence that a tap had even been performed. As it subsequently developed, an in camera hearing (done away from the public for national security purposes) determined that the tap had been performed, but that it had been authorized by a FISA court. Case dismissed. In this case, the judge found similar clear and compelling evidence. Or so he says.

In fact, the only thing that was presented was an allegation of an internal memo indicating that Al-Haramain was receiving e-mails from Afghanistan and Pakistan from known terrorist strongholds. That memo was sent in error by a clerk at a federal agency to the "charity" organization's lawyer. But, and note this, there is no mention whatsoever of a wiretap, or even a pending wiretap. Determining by electronic surveillance that a foreign terrorist organization is sending communications to an individual or organization within the Unites States is a perfectly valid exercise under several old and new federal statutes. So what the judge is allowing the "charity" to do is turn a document demonstrating legal activity into a legal claim that the government was conducting an illegal wiretap. Sheesh. And in fact, the judge allowed a suit that really only alleges that "they were targeted for surveillance," not that they were actually the subjects of surveillance.

Now this may surprise you. The Bush Justice Department opposed the suit, and was successful. But then the terrorist organization made its way to San Francisco. Yet even the Obama Justice Department has argued, vigorously, that the suit is frivolous, and states no grounds for risking a national security breach. If the Obama/Holder Justice Department thinks the suit is a dangerous waste of time, imagine how weak it must actually be. But that will never stop a judge in San Francisco. The current Justice Department attorney on the case argued very logically that the whole suit is "based on mere speculation, is simply an inappropriate attempt to attack a program which has already been upheld at every level of appellate review, and would reveal information about intelligence sources and methods." It didn't bother Holder much in the CIA cases he's planning to pursue, but I'll take whatever I can get. The terrorists' attorney argued solely on the basis that Bush administration officials had said that a west coast Islamic organization had probably been tapped. But no serious offer of proof that the organization was Al-Haramain, or that the wire tap had not been preceded by a FISA warrant.
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Captioning: Hillary Clinton. . . Time Traveler

Mistaking the Presidential Port-A-Potty for the Presidential Time Machine, Hillary Clinton emerges to declare her intent to run for President in 1996 BC (Before Clinton).




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Obama's Re-Election Looks Less Likely All The Time

Much has been written recently about President Obama's greatest bloopers, his missteps, and his tin ear for what the public is trying to tell him. His administration is in disarray, under assault from every direction, frequently within his own party. Scandals are cropping up like weeds, and the mysteries of his past and present political connections are starting to leak out.

There is one factor which may ultimately determine his electoral future that hasn't been discussed very much. And that is the likely state of the economy during the next two election cycles. Even if the economy improves slightly by the end of Obama's first term, he may not be able to use that to his advantage.

If past history teaches us certain bedrock truths, one of them is that whether it's true or not, the administration in power gets blamed for the economy if it's bad, and gets credit for it if it's good. The only analysis that really defines this truism is that the only view that matters is what the public views as "good" or "bad." And frequently it isn't what the statisticians, economists, doom-sayers, or politicians say it is. The public views the health of the economy in ways that sociologists describe as "relative deprivation." In other words, how good or bad is the economy in relation to those things I consider most important?

Obama may succeed in some small measure in accomplishing what his Democratic predecessors Harry Truman, Jimmy Carter, and Bill Clinton failed at. He seems likely to get at least some form of health care reform through Congress. That would make a small hole in his "incompetence index" but is also likely to make another hole in the economy. As sympathetic editor John Judis says at the New Republic: "But it may not help him and his party avoid setbacks at the polls."

Judis goes on to a very realistic assessment of the current political climate. "Consider the danger signs slowly accumulating. The off-year gubernatorial elections in New Jersey and Virginia are usually a harbinger of political success or failure for the party in power. When Republicans George Allen and Christine Todd Whitman won those races in November 1993, it was a clear indication of trouble ahead for the Democrats nationally. Currently, Republicans are leading in the polls in both states--states that Obama won in 2008."

I'm not quite as willing to read final significance into this indicator, but it certainly is a developing trend that is good news for the Republicans, if they don't blow it. Conditions were similar but not the same in 1993. For one thing, the Republican Party had figured out that Clinton had been right during the election when he said "it's the economy, stupid." They saw the mistakes the first President Bush had made during the election, and were determined not to repeat them. And they had a strong, coherent plan for victory which was called "the contract with America," which laid out conservative goals clearly, including the economy.

Currently, the great debate is over health care. But if Obama had successfully trotted out a coherent plan, gotten bipartisan support, and passed the legislation, the question still remains whether that would make any difference whatsoever in his poll ratings. And that is because over health care, cap and trade, and the other grand schemes of the Democratic Party looms the one factor that could cripple all their efforts--the economy. And history also demonstrates that even a mild improvement in the economy might not be sufficient to still the worries of the American people about the very future of the United States.

While Obama has succeeded in absolutely nothing that would improve the economy, his do-gooder soft socialism is likely to cause the economy to stagnate or decline. Health care and clean air are wonderful things, but when you've lost your job, your 401Ks have tanked, your prospects of getting a new job even faintly resembling your former wage level have declined to near-zero, and your unemployment insurance is about to run out, doctor visits and cleaner air just don't have the ring of urgency that they might in a healthy economy.

Since January, Obama's poll numbers have declined from 69% approval with an accompanying 13% disapproval to approval at approximately 50% and disapproval rates in the mid- to high-forties. Even Democratic pollsters now think there is a substantial chance the Democrats could lose Senate seats in Nevada, Connecticut, Illinois and Colorado, and suffer a twenty seat loss in the House. Any presidential "coattail effect" has been completely discounted. It appears that a more than normal off-year election loss for the incumbent party will produce a resurgent Republican Party.

When Ronald Reagan won election, the economy was suffering from a new economic phenomenon--"stagflation," a bizarre combination of slow/no growth in the economy and large growth in the cost of living. Economists looked to the unemployment rate of 7.2% as a major cause of Carter's defeat. At the beginning of his term, Reagan had a 28% disapproval rating, largely in proportion to the number of self-identified liberals. By the same time in 1983, the unemployment rate had risen to 10.8% and Reagan's disapproval ratings were at 54%. He appeared to be in real trouble for the election.

The Democrats picked up seats in both Houses of Congress, and the future of the Reagan presidency was in danger. Yet by election time in 1984, the unemployment rate had dropped back to 7.2%. The difference between the mid-term figures and the re-election figures were viewed as positive and Reagan's disapproval rating had dropped to 30%. Few seemed to notice that the unemployment numbers were exactly the same as those which had been cited by many voters as a reason to vote Carter out. And Reagan was re-elected in a landslide.

But Reagan had many other things going for him. He was always positive about America. Obama only speaks in positive terms of America when he speaks of changing it. Otherwise, we're just another nation, among many others, with a history of oppression, racism and self-centeredness. It is coming off worse than even Carter's "great national malaise." An economic turnaround comparable to Reagan's would be unlikely to produce the same result.

Reagan had one other big thing going for him. He knew his plans were working, and he had the guts to stick with them despite contrary advice. He obtained major decreases in taxes. He accomplished some serious rollbacks in government programs, although not as drastic as what he wanted. And he was able to convey to the American people that if they stuck with the plan, the economy would continue to improve. And improve it did. He was not only able to claim the economy was improving, even though at that point the unemployment rate had merely returned to where it was when he started, but he was also able to show that it was his government-trimming and tax-reductions which were accomplishing the upward economic trends.

Obama has already increased taxes, though he denies it, in violation of his promise not to raise taxes on "ordinary people." And now he is hauling out the old Democratic nostrum of "eating the rich." Whether he raises taxes directly, or merely allows the Bush tax-cuts to expire, taxes will go up. And he still has to pay for his immense social schemes. He himself has as much as admitted that if a version of health care reform even faintly similar to his proposals is passed by Congress, taxes will have to go up. Any possible up-tick in the economy (even if accompanied by a downward trend in unemployment) is very unlikely to be attributed to his administration. The economy will still be in crisis as seen by the general public, and they will see no corresponding indication that Obama is doing anything which will improve that condition.

So let's take a look at the case of Bill Clinton. He came into office on his "it's the economy, stupid" mantra. The first Bush had boldly declared in his first election bid: "Read my lips, no new taxes." But his weak performance on the economy in office, combined with a hostile Democratic Congress, caused him to break that promise. Of course the tax increase solved nothing, duplicated some of the stagflation of the Carter years, and cost him the presidency when he lost the support of the activist conservative wing of the Republican Party.

Clinton won his election by a plurality, not a majority. But he did win a majority in the electoral college. Though seemingly well-liked, there had been no messiah-like surge in his constituency. Clinton then proceeded to make some major missteps, not the least of which was his Hillarycare national health reform efforts. He was soundly defeated in Congress, and in the mid-term elections he was handed "the Republican revolution." Within a short period of time, he was in the position of denying that he was "irrelevant." But the "revolution" was really not much more than a rejection of Democrat social schemes, including the ever-growing welfare system and the perception of rudderlessness.

So what happened with the economy? It began to improve, in palpable ways. But even by the end of his first term, it had not improved so significantly as to be credited to him without one very important factor. Unlike the determined and tone-deaf Obama, Clinton realized that if he wanted to be re-elected, he had to participate in the recovery. And he was practical enough to recognize the Republicans had a good thing going for them, so why not take credit for it? He performed what has been called "triangulation" which meant he appeared to disagree with the Republicans while implementing or acceding to the Republican social and economic legislation.

Clinton went from "irrelevancy" to re-election by a fairly comfortable margin, even while the Republicans retained both House of Congress and a majority of the state governorships. People who don't really know the realities of the situation still repeat that Clinton "fixed the economy." But he was willing to compromise, clever enough to take credit for much of what the other party had actually done, and very public about supporting legislation which could actually be traced to the economic recovery directly while ignoring the cries of the left wing of his own party.

It will likely remain unclear during his lifetime if Clinton actually supported Hillarycare or not. But he knew one thing for sure. If it had been passed, and if it made the huge hole in the economy that it was most likely to do, the resultant economic downturn would be blamed on him. And he would not be re-elected. Unlike Obama, Clinton actually paid attention to what the American public was saying. And he never insulted his non-politician opponents by calling them demagogues or liars for disagreeing with him. In a small way, he even understood that one of his duties along with proposing was to carry out the will of the American people, even when it wasn't what he wanted personally. On occasion, he would even say to his public opponents "I hear what you're saying."

So why did Reagan and Clinton both get re-elected during an early, relatively minor economic recovery? And why do I think that Obama won't be able to duplicate their success, either in Congress in the mid-term or in the general election two years later? It is not sufficient that the economy be in slightly better condition than when you took office. It has to appear to be improving in ways that the voters perceive to be the direct result of the actions of the administration in power. None of those indicia are currently in view with the Obama administration. Economists, statisticians and politicians can declare anything they want, but what the public perceives is the only factor that matters.

The best recent example of this is that near the end of the first President Bush's term, economists of every stripe declared that the recession was over. But the public saw taxes going up, unemployment remaining static or increasing slightly, and wages in real dollars stagnating. They saw an economy in continuing decline. Bush was tone-deaf, much like Obama, so he addressed the economy in exactly the wrong way. But Clinton knew how to read both the economic indicators and the public's perception of the economy. And he played them like a harp.

Both Clinton and Reagan suffered economic downturns at the beginning of their terms, and slow recovery toward the end of their first terms. Both were capable of minimizing the effects of the early downturn and gaining credit for the upturns as the direct result of their economic policies. Unless Obama gets miraculously lucky, or he comes up with a major piece of legislation which can be seen by the general public as a direct cause of an economic turnaround, he will be unable to do what Clinton and Reagan both did brilliantly, and in entirely different ways. Obama's complete inability to see that his grand schemes are simply not resonating with the American public will be his downfall. Even in the event of a minor improvement in the economy by the end of his first term, he will be unable to point to a single thing his administration has done which directly caused that improvement. It's a fatal flaw in his view of how to govern.
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Why Obama Is A Failure. . .

In Sunday’s article, I outlined Obama’s long list of failures and showed how this supposedly talented wunderkind of a President has been a total bust at getting his policies implemented. Despite the massive advantages Obama currently enjoys, including being virtually unopposed politically, Team Obama has failed to get any of his policy goals put into law. Let’s talk about why. . .

Before we begin, I’d like to give a little shout out to loyal Commentarama reader New York Governor David Paterson, who chose this week (no doubt after reading Sunday’s article) to echo my sentiments. Says the good Governor:

“If you look at it from [Team Obama’s] perspective, they haven’t exactly been able to govern in the first year of their administration in the way that other administrations have, where you would have, theoretically, a period in which the new administration is allowed to pass the needed pieces of legislation.”

Oooo, buuuuuuurn.

So why has Obama been less successful governing than your average megalomaniac cannibal who ran on a platform of eating us all? It’s actually not that hard to understand. Yet, as more and more articles start asking this question -- or at least a similar question -- it is clear they don’t get it:

• Laughably, the leftist Guardian UK blames Republicans.

• The Jerusalem Post wrongly claims it’s because the economy is so weak that people believe Obama won’t get re-elected, and thus they think he won’t have any power until after he’s re-elected (when he becomes a lame duck).

• Jimmy “the Jackass” Carter blames racism, and the flying elves that keep touching Jimmy’s stools when he doesn’t take his medication.

So what’s the real story? The real story is that Obama is the classic example of a spoiled child. He grew up without anyone challenging him and without ever having to solve his own problems, but with everyone telling him how special he is. Now he’s full of self-esteem, full of petulance and anger, unable to relate to other people, and unable to admit that he can make mistakes, but without a hint of the talent or experience needed for the challenges he faces.

Consider Obama The Empty Suit

During the election I remember thinking how much Obama reminded me of many of the young lawyers I've met. They are super sure that if they just get the chance to “do their thing”, they can solve any problem. Of course, they can’t tell you what that “thing” is or how it will work, or how it differs from what others have already tried. Yet, that inability to detail a strategy doesn’t change their arrogant belief in their own irresistibility in the slightest, nor does it warn them of the flaws in their plans. And as one would expect, time and time again, these cocksure kids get their rears handed to them by their more experienced foes.

Obama struck me as just another of these arrogant kids, a judgment that seems to have been borne out, and this has destroyed him both in foreign policy and domestically.

Foreign Policy Failures

Obama assured us that he could just sit with the Iranians or the “moderate” Taliban and through sheer force of personality, he could bend them to his will. Yet he could never explain exactly what he was going to say. And this was because there was no plan. The entire plan assumed they would accept his offer and all would be forgiven. But they didn’t accept his offer, and he didn’t know how to deal with that rejection. Thus, he walked away from both.

What he never understood was that they might not believe him, or might not want what he was offering. And rather than learning from his mistakes, as an experienced or more humble or more talented politician would, Obama was handicapped by years of unearned praise that kept him from learning how to deal with rejection. . . how to deal with failure. . . how to turn failure into success. So, confused and unhappy, he fell back on his inherent petulance and he walked away. If they weren’t going to accept his gift of words, he would not be bothered with them.

And because he will not learn, this has become the hallmark of his foreign policy. He offered to talk with the North Koreans, the Chinese, the Indians, the Russians, the Arab World, and the Hondurans. He expected each to fall to their knees, giddy at the chance they were being offered to reset their relationship with the United States through him, and soon they would cry out “what oh irresistible one must we do to please you?” But it never happened. Like the arrogant young lawyers, his experienced foes saw through him in a heartbeat and wiped out his game plan by denying his irresistibility. With his plans in tatters, he walked away in each instance, causing the foreign policy failures outlined on Sunday.

Domestic Policy Failures

The same dynamic destroyed his domestic agenda.

When Obama came to power, he had stratospheric approval ratings, a working super-majority, and a disorganized opposition (if you can even call it that). He could have gotten a bill to change the name of the country to “Obamaland” through the Congress if only he’d had one ready. But he had no legislation ready, because he had no plan.

Once again, Obama believed that all he had to do was flash his irresistibility, and the Congress (a collection of hyperselfish creatures) would come together in harmony and quickly, efficiently, and without opposition assemble a series of bills putting together his agenda.

He never understood what it takes for politicians to convince others to support their plans. He never understood the need to build personal relationships and to form coalitions. Instead, he told the Republicans “elections have consequences” and “I won.” He made the blue dogs vote on cap and trade, even though it could never pass the Senate, and it could cost them their seats. He refused to resolve the dispute within his own party over how to pay for health care reform, even as the bill was bleeding support. And he utterly failed to grasp the need for subtlety in the application of public pressure, instead demonizing all who opposed him, no matter how minor, and insulting vast swaths of the American people. In each instance, when things went wrong, he walked away, leaving others to clean up the mess.

As a result of this, Obama drove down his own poll numbers with his lack of leadership, his insulting tactics, and his compounding failures. As his poll numbers fell and the number of people hurt by his tantrums grew -- and as he showed himself to be an unreliable ally, his power to push through anything became less and less.

Can Obama save this sinking ship? In all honesty, I would have to say no. He has shown no ability to learn from his mistakes or even to handle the slightest resistance. And now that he’s made so many enemies and he’s revived the opposition and awoken the public, he will face increasingly greater opposition on all issues -- something he is not psychologically prepared to handle. Could this change, possibly. But, at this point, he hasn’t even shown that he’s aware of the problem.

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You Want A New Drug. . .

From the top of Commentarama Towers (right), the Commentarama Science Division has done it again! With the assistance of stimulus dollars and secure in the knowledge that air travel is safe now that little old ladies can no longer smuggle nail scissors onto planes, the CSD has come up with the perfect pill to treat the symptoms of liberal angst: Placebocort™.

Are you worried about things? Does stuff seem kind of dangerous to you? Do you find yourself wondering why nobody does something to fix these things?

Well don’t let your liberal angst ruin your life. Ask your Congressman about Placebocort™. Placebocort™ is the little red pill from the makers of the Guaranteed Security Device, the Cost-Free Bail Out Pill, Unearned Respect, and the Self-Esteem vaccination.

Don’t let the real world keep you down. Take Placebocort™ and feel better. Placebocort™ works by making you think that liberal policies will actually improve your life. Afraid that the economy is in the tank, Placebocort™ lets you believe that spending “government money” will fix that right up. Afraid that terrorist will turn your city into a smoldering heap of ash with an Iranian bomb, Placebocort™ lets you believe that endangering Poland will make Iran change its ways. Afraid your kids aren’t being educated, Placebocort™ lets you believe that paying the same failing teachers more will make it all better. Take the pill. . . ignorance is bliss. . .



“I don’t have the intelligence to comprehend cause and effect, and I want someone else to solve all my problems, and that makes Placebocort™ a good choice for me!” -- Joe B.


Placebocort™ is not intended to treat liberalism, though it gives temporary relief to liberal angst. Symptoms will return in an intensified way with Placebocort™. Placebocort™ should not be taken by conservatives, by women who are pregnant, have been pregnant, could become pregnant or could have become pregnant, or by anyone with a will to live.

Placebocort™ is not intended to replace actual, workable policies, and it may interfere with your learning reflex.

Side-effects are generally considered moderate to heavy, at first, and grow in intensity over time. Symptoms may include unintended consequences, confusion, delusions, euphoria, intensified stupidity, increased deficits, decreased security, loss of opportunity, worsening health, diarrhea, and even death, though other symptoms generally lessen following death.




“I’m enjoying life again because of Placebocort™.” Hillary C.






Do not drink alcohol to excess with Placebocort™, but do drink alcohol.

If you go blind while taking Placebocort™, just keep taking more until sight returns.

See your doctor if liberalism worsens.



“Placebocort™ helped me see my opponents as Nazis, which is nice, but I don't like the moderate to heavy diarrhea.” Nancy P.







** These statements not evaluated by the FDA.

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Does the "G" in G-20 Stand for "Ghost Town"?

By Pittsburgh Enigma

Pittsburgh will be hosting a G-20 summit this week on Thursday and Friday, but many businesses will be closing for the duration due to fears for the safety of their employees and fears of property damage. As if this should surprise any city officials. London and Seattle certainly come to mind.

Ghost Town

It was announced last week that the entire "Golden Triangle", the central downtown business district, will be closed to vehicular traffic. The only cars allowed to enter will be residents, and they will have to show ID at one of three police checkpoints. So if don't live downtown, forget going to work -- you can't enter the area.

There are seven bridges that provide access to the Golden Triangle. Only two of those bridges will allow traffic into the city. To call this a traffic nightmare would be an understatement. There have already been reports warning that neighborhoods immediately outside the triangle would be crushed with rerouted traffic. So besides the concerns about employee safety and property damage, some business may just not want to deal with the traffic headaches.

Ghost Of Things To Come

I've been collecting some eyebrow-raising G-20 news snippets for the last several weeks from local news outlets:

* Code Pink was given a permit to set up a "tent city" in Point State Park, a highly visible state park located at the confluence of the three rivers within the "Golden Triangle."

* State police have found two 50-gallon drums of urine in an abandoned warehouse along with battery powered "super soakers", which they believed might have been put there by protesters.

* Officials also found material that they thought might be used to construct a "sleeping dragon", which is a technique used by protesters to chain themselves together to make it more difficult to be disbursed by police.

* The local Central Blood Bank has been sending out e-mails asking for increased blood donation prior to the G-20 "in case of an emergency."

* A federal judge ordered the release of up to 1,000 prisoners (non-violent offenders) from the county jail to make room for protesters that may be arrested this week.

* Pittsburgh City Council rejected a safety proposal that would've disallowed protesters from wearing masks to conceal their identity. So if any news footage captures protesters in the act of vandalizing property, we may not be able to identify them.

One can't help reflecting on how interesting it is that half a million conservative protesters can descend on Washington D.C. with no violence, no property damage and no arrests, yet when the left protests in much smaller numbers, it's almost a guarantee that you will have all of these problems.

Some Mysterious and Sudden Cosmetic Improvements

I live in a part of Pittsburgh known as "Mt. Washington", which is located on a high hill directly across the river from the Golden Triangle and affords a spectacular view of the city. This area will therefore be attracting a lot of the dignitaries and journalists this week.

Back in the early summer, before I was consciously thinking about the upcoming G-20, I started noticing a lot of cosmetic improvements on Mt. Washington. First, there was the cutting of the trees to make it easier to see the city. (Yes, we killed a lot of perfectly good trees.) Then there were sidewalk improvements and street light replacements. And then, our perfectly adequate garbage cans disappeared and were replaced with brand spanking new shiny black trash cans with the words "Taking Care of Business," and under that, "Luke Ravenstahl, Mayor." (Keep in mind, we're essentially a bankrupt city, which may be why our young mayor is sometimes referred to as "The Boy Blunder.") Mrs. Enigma and myself thought that maybe young Luke is angling for the job of Obama's garbage czar.

But I digress... next, the access road connecting Mt. Washington to downtown received a shiny new coat of asphalt. Then, scaffolding appeared around the historic incline building to give the old girl a new coat of paint. And a week or two ago, a lot of "Pittsburgh Welcomes the World" banners appeared on all the light posts along Grand View avenue.

If nothing else, at least my neighborhood will have gotten some improvements as a result of the G-20. Oh wait... did I just hear that my property taxes are going up? So much for a free lunch.

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Through The Legal Looking Glass--The Nine Gray Eminences

Associate Justice Antonin Gregory Scalia: He was born on March 11, 1936 in Trenton, New Jersey. He is an only child. His father was an Italian immigrant and a professor of Romance languages who comes from Sicily. His mother was an American born lady of Italian heritage. When he was five, the family moved to the Elmhurst section of Queens, New York where his father taught at Brooklyn College.

He began his education at PS 13 in Queens, and his parents wanted him to have a parochial education, so he attended high school at Jesuit Xavier High School in Manhattan. Scalia then went on to Georgetown, where he graduated summa cum laude with a bachelor's degree in history in 1957. He also spent a year studying in an exchange program with the University of Fridbourg, Switzerland. From there, it was on to Harvard Law, where he was an editor of the Law Review. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard Law in 1960, and was honored as a Sheldon Fellow of Harvard University, allowing him to travel in Europe for studies.

Scalia married Maureen McCarthy, who was a Radcliffe graduate. Each was an only child and didn't want their family to be as small. They have had nine children, four girls and five boys. All went on to college and professional careers, except for son Paul David who became a Catholic priest and Matthew who joined the U.S. Army officer corps after graduating from West Point. He is now a major in the 82nd Airborne Division.

Upon return to the United States in 1961, Scalia began his legal career with the civil litigation firm of Jones, Day, Cockley and Reavis in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1967, he took a position as a professor of law at the University of Virginia, where he remained until 1971. He then took a position as general counsel for the Office of Telecommunications Policy under President Nixon. Much of his work set the course of cable television that remains essentially unaltered today. He also helped set policy giving more oversight of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting to branches other than the FCC to stop the rapid growth of a government-funded organization which was completely unregulated by any elected body. He also assisted in giving more power to local CPB boards and reducing the influence of the national organization.

In 1972, he was appointed by President Gerald Ford to the position of Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel. In 1977, in the wake of the election of Jimmy Carter, Scalia re-started his academic career, taking a position as a professor of law at the University of Chicago, and then as visiting professor of law at Georgetown and Stanford law schools. During the summer recesses, he was a law professor at the Tulane Law School summer abroad program. From 1981 to 1983, he served on the American Bar Association's Section of Administrative Law, first as assistant chairman, and then as chairman. At each stage of his judicial career, the ABA ranked him "highly qualified."

President Ronald Reagan took notice of him early in his administration, and in July of 1982 nominated Scalis as a Judge of the U. S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. His decisions were so well-reasoned that when Reagan nominated Scalia in 1986 to replace Supreme Court Justice William Rehnquist (whom Reagan was naming as Chief Justice) he received support even from famous liberals such as Governor Mario Cuomo of New York. He was confirmed by the Senate on a 98 to 0 vote (two Senators absent). Yes, you did read that right. We'll never see that kind of vote again.

Scalia is a "formalist" on the Supreme Court. That is a variation of the broader term of strict constructionist, and is also occasionally called "textualist." Scalia describes a "bright line" of rules over abstract balancing tests, which leads him to conclude that the Constitution is a bedrock document, not an ever-evolving "living" document. He looks first and foremost to the actual wording of the Constitution, and only secondarily at the tradition and history of law when the wording of the Constitution is unclear or doesn't specifically address the issue at bar. When one opponent at a debate at Yale said that if the Constitution wasn't a living document, then it was a dead document, Scalia shot back with "no, it's an enduring Constitution."

He diverges slightly from the other conservative Justices on the issue of interpreting statutory language utilizing the "legislative history" approach. He considers legislative history to be far too malleable and essentially a fraud. He goes so far as to say that judges should never even consider legislative history, as distinguished from legislative intent. If the intent is not spelled out in the statute, then it must be viewed strictly by the words of the statute as they relate to the Constitution. This puts him frequently in direct conflict with Justice Breyer, who loves to go into extensive detail about the legislative history of a statute being questioned before the Court.

His "bright line" approach means that he gives considerable deference to the acts of the legislature over judicial hijacking by the use of abstract balancing tests. On this subject, he wrote a treatise, famous to lawyers and law students, entitled The Rule of Law as a Law of Rules. Thus, he believes that moderation may be a great thing for legislatures and executives, but it has no place in the judicial arena. He asked: "What is a 'moderate' interpretation of the Constitution--halfway between what it says and what you want it to say?" He is widely considered a conservative justice, but his deep belief in strict interpretation has put him occasionally at odds with political conservatives, along with his colleague Justice Thomas.

It has also been argued that Scalia's jurisprudence is Hamiltonian in nature. That is to say, he does not see the federal government as inherently evil, and is not averse to that government exercising its constitutional functions. When he slaps down the government in an opinion, he does so on the basis that the federal power has not been used wisely. And for that reason, he occasionally finds himself at odds with his fellow conservatives on the issue of stare decisis. He is completely willing to overturn a precedent which has no constitutional authority, but he has voted to uphold certain exercises of power that date back to the Roosevelt New Deal on the basis of stare decisis. This is because he is not inherently opposed to new legislative exercises of government power like some of his fellow conservatives. His preference for rules over abstract interpretation leads him to use stare decisis as a rule to support decisions he doesn't like, but in which he can't find constitutional flaws in the earlier decision's reasoning. When charged with inconsistency on stare decisis versus originalism, he responds that stare decisis is a pragmatic exception to, not a part of, originalism. In his view, better a bad rule than no rule at all.

On separation of powers, Scalia is a near-absolutist. The best example of this was his dissent in a case in 1989 which upheld the federal sentencing guidelines. His problem with the guidelines is that the guidelines were handed to the Court for approval by the U. S. Sentencing Commission, a non-judicial authority set up by the executive branch. He saw that as an unconstitutional mixing of power between two separate branches of government. But this also means that when the legislature sticks to legislating and the executive sticks to administrating, he will support their separate authority. He therefore strongly opposes Congressional interference with the President's charge "to take care that the Laws be faithfully executed."

His strict constructionist views make him quite predictable on the issue of rights granted by the Constitution. He will never be convinced that the Constitution ever intended there to be a right of privacy which has wrought so much misery and so much conflict. He abhors abortion, but he sees no constitutional authority for the federal government to act on the issue, either affirmatively or prohibitively. He is not a proponent of the incorporation doctrine imposing the federal rules contained in the 14th Amendment to the states. Thus, he sees no authority for the federal courts to get involved in legal issues such as assisted suicide, sodomy, or punitive damages in state courts, let alone address them as issues for Supreme Court review as matters addressed by the federal Constitution. He also opposes federal intervention in death penalty matters where the state rules differ from the federal rules. For instance, he sees no problem with states imposing their own rules on executing minors or defendants with mental deficiency.

He is a strong proponent of procedural due process, which he sees as the only due process meant by the Founders. This fits with his idea of rules as being the foundation of good and consistent law. It also caused him to surprise conservatives (though it shouldn't have) when he voted in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld that detention of a U.S. citizen as an enemy combatant without being charged is a violation of due process. He doesn't oppose the idea of the detention, but believes instead that habeas corpus should be available to every American citizen until Congress legislates an exception, which it has never done.

On the bench, Scalia varies rather rarely from his basic views, but has both a collegial temperament, and is known for injecting humor into his questioning at oral argument before the Court. His nickname is "Nino," and the justices are said to look forward to brief memos from him that have been tagged "Ninograms." Strange as it may seem, he is closer to the very liberal Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg personally than with any of the other justices. Yet he almost never votes with her, and his closest ideological ally on the Court is Justice Thomas. Where he diverges from Thomas, which is not often, it is over the very small difference in "strict construction" that forms their basic respective views.

When the exact words of the Constitution are not clear, or don't directly address the issue before the Court, Thomas looks to natural law and the works of the Founding Fathers including the Declaration of Independence and the Federalist Papers. Roberts and Alito look to "original intent" as interpreted by the times contemporary with the Founding Documents, a broader standard. The liberal members of the Court look to "evolving standards" (in other words, the "living Constitution"). Scalia specifically looks to the "original words." If they are not clear, he will search contemporary dictionaries and legal treatises from the time to see what the words actually meant at the time the Constitution was written. This formed his firm philosophy that due process means only procedural due process, and that substantive due process was a judicial fiat conducted by the Warren Court liberals to change the entire basis of due process from what the Founders wrote.

Scalia joined with Justice Souter in his strong opinion of televising Supreme Court sessions. He praised Souter for saying "the day you see a camera come into our courtroom, it's going to roll over my dead body." The only way he would consider yielding would be anathema to "news" services. He would agree to television and audio in the Supreme Court during oral argument only if a rule were imposed that required that the whole session, start to finish, be broadcast unedited and uncommented on until the complete session had been broadcast, gavel to gavel. He has said that his objection to anything less than gavel to gavel coverage relates to the likelihood of sensationalism, excerptation, out-of-context quotes, and the fostering of an inaccurate picture of the operations of the Supreme Court.

Unlike Ginbsurg, whom he considers his intellectual equal and his judicial opponent, it is unlikely that Scalia will form a friendship with new Justice Sotomayor. He has been highly critical of her appellate court decisions, attacking not just the conclusions, but the highly-flawed reasoning and poor workmanship that went into them. He was particularly critical of her recent Ricci v New Haven discrimination decision, which he considered to have absolutely no constitutional or legal authority whatsoever, and which he considered to have violated every rule of due process possible.
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Question: Juries?

Having spent the day playing a twisted game of inverse bingo, hoping that my juror number would not be called, I was finally released back into the wild this evening without even the satisfaction of sentencing some unfortunate jerk to hang for wasting my time. And that got me wondering, are juries really a good thing? We don't pick random people from crowds to fly planes, should amateurs be staffing our juries? What do you think? [+] Read More...

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The Elves Went To The Opera

By the Boiler Room Elves

Little known fact about elves: In addition to hammering away at toy trains, luring hobbits off forest paths, and baking cookies, our list of favorite hobbies includes --- opera. So when we snuck out to DC for the protest, we did our best to score some tickets to the Washington National Opera's performance of Rossini's The Barber of Seville, a bel canto comedic opera. It's one of our long-standing favorites, and this production did not disappoint. Great singing, fantastic staging, and a plethora of honest-to-goodness laugh-out-loud moments made this one of the best we've seen.

The Barber of Seville is a great intro opera for non-opera goers. . . think of it as a gateway opera. It's light-hearted, relatively fast-paced, and full of Bugs Bunny music. "Bugs Bunny music?" you ask? Sure. Cartoons in the olden days used to do a great job of prepping kids to become literate adults, familiar with cultural treasures long before the kids hit the age when classic literature, music and art become boring and irrelevant... but we digress.

Adults who have never been to an opera are often surprised to find themselves in the middle of one suddenly humming along and saying, "I know that piece!" From where? Kids' cartoons generally. Most everyone will recognize "Kill the Wabbit, kill the wabbit, kill the waaaaabbit" from Bugs Bunny, but not as many would be able to identify it as Richard Wagner's "Ride of the Valkyries" from Act 3 of Die Walkuere. Most of us have seen The Rabbit of Seville, which is taken directly from The Barber of Seville. And there are many, many more.

The Barber of Seville also should appeal to anyone who enjoys a nice Shakespearean comedy. Operas fall broadly into comedies and tragedies, much like Greek plays and Shakespeare. In the comedies, the young lovers need to overcome some obstacle to get married and the bad guy needs to be properly embarrassed and learn the error of his ways; in the tragedies we like to have a nice high body count on the stage, preferably singing a long aria before shuffling off this mortal coil. You'll also notice two types of singing - the arias which are sung for the beauty and tune, and the recitatives which tell the story and move the plot along. The arias are Shakespeare's soliloquies - they contain the most beautiful and memorable pieces, and they're arguably the reason why we go, but the basic plot is complete without them.

The Barber of Seville does not disappoint - a man sees a woman locked away on her balcony, she sees him, they immediately fall into undying love. He must disguise himself to free her from her "evil" guardian who plots to marry her himself. Oh no! Enter the barber Figaro (yes - Figaro, Figaro, Figaro, Fiii-ga-roooooooooo) who lives to help young lovers unite against all odds. Figaro helps our hero disguise himself so we can have a series of mistaken identities and funny situations. (Shakespeare again, or perhaps Three's Company, anyone?) Our hero, by the way, conveniently happens to be the local rich Duke, unbeknownst to our lady fair, who thinks she has fallen for a poor man. This way she can be justly rewarded for not being a gold-digger, but for being true to her heart. Ahhhh... And of course, at the end, after much mayhem, the "evil" guardian comes around and gives the young lovers his blessing, and Puck-- I mean Figaro! - gives us our lesson and we all sing ourselves off into the night.

Please note, we elves have not had a chance to study music theory or the history of opera. We're hardly experts, but we know what we like, and we like The Barber of Seville. If you ever have a chance to see it, it's a great one to start with. You can watch a clip from the DC production HERE.

And if you're interested in seeing some really great opera, but either don't have access to a decent company close by or just don't want to get all gussied up and pay that much, check out the NY Met's broadcasts. They have recently started to broadcast their operas in high-definition to participating movie theaters all over the country. Opera while munching on popcorn and wearing your favorite pair of green tights at relatively cheap prices? Now that's something to sing about. Of the upcoming season, the elves would recommend Carmen in January for lots and lots of Bugs Bunny music with a great plot and no boring music.


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Peacemaker Obama Heads For the U.N.

Taking a rest from from lobbying Americans twenty-four hours a day for national health care, President Obama is preparing for his debutante ball at the United Nations General Assembly on Tuesday. Given his propensity for accommodationism, one-worldism, and self-promotion, it is likely that he will receive a much nicer welcome from the organization than he has been receiving at home of late.

Obama's reputed ability to walk on water, turn water into wine, and turn money into smoke still seems to be admired by the tin-pot dictators and kumbaya crowd at the U.N. Of course the successors of Nikita Khruschev have taken note of the President's agenda as well. So far, they like it. The picture above is a 1963 American IRBM in the ready position during the Cuban Missile Crisis brought on by John Kennedy's weak performance in Vienna two years earlier.

The General Assembly: Obama's predecessor first spoke to the General Assembly about international security and terrorism in the aftermath of the 9-11 attacks. Obama will speak on climate change, nonproliferation and development in the less productive parts of the world. Topics before the world body which he may also address include the world economy, education for girls, peacekeeping, curbing sexual violence and streamlining the U.N.'s ability to accomplish absolutely nothing worthwhile while spending billions.

Obama's coming-out party will kick off with a meeting on climate change (formerly known as global warming) in which he will talk to the "leaders" and foreign junk scientists about reducing carbon emissions and other man-made gases which play next-to-no part in global climate change. But they do play a huge part in making money for corporations designed to enrich the eco-elite at the expense of impoverishing the developed world. He might even try to convince the first and third-largest pollution producers, China and India, to give up their industrial and economic advances in order to allow America time to catch down with them. Kyoto, hell, we're preparing to go the Copenhagen conference in December to ruin our economy with or without China's and India's help.

Also on Tuesday, Obama will speak to sub-Saharan African countries about job creation for young people, creating a better trade and investment atmosphere, and to mobilize African agriculture to create jobs and help feed the continent. Well, that's never worked before, but now he can send in platoons of unemployed ACORN workers who will organize the communities to pursue those activities and make the continent bloom. It is unclear how much the President expects the Africans to do for themselves or how they're going to do it in the middle of civil wars, mass murders, slavery, and tribal warfare.

The formal ball begins on Wednesday at the official opening of the General Assembly's "working" year. Following Secretary-General and Spendthrift-in-Chief Ban Ki-moon and President Lula da Silva of Brazil, the U.S. President will step to the podium. It's somehow appropriate that since Obama's policies are quickly turning American into a third-world nation that he should speak third.

The enthusiasm among the delegates is palpable. The Palestinian Authority (that Hamas/Fatah hybrid) expressed its love for a U.S. President who will not use Mr. Bush's lecturing tone, but instead have an attitude of open-mindedness. It is considered "open-minded" to call terrorists "freedom fighters" and mass-murderers "liberators." Ghana's delegate wants to hear the speech because "he [Obama] is very supportive of the U.N. agenda." Well, that's true. The U.N. agenda is to weaken America into insignificance. France, Libya, and Lebanon have also expressed admiration for Obama's open-mindedness. I think someone forgot to tell these people that too much open-mindedness leads to everything spilling out of the head and onto the ground.

Other things that thrill the U.N. are Obama's apparent willingness to support the International Criminal Court (in complete disregard of the Constitution, that trifling parochial American document), and his executive order putting the United States back on the U.N. Human Rights Council, formerly chaired by civil libertarian Moammar Qaddafi, and shunned by President Bush. U.S. Ambassador Susan Rice explained that the United States has joined the HRC "fully aware of its many flaws, but we recognize that we can't fix it or contribute to fixing it simply by carping from the outside." Sounds like "if you can't lick 'em, join 'em" to me, but what do I know?

Obama is also assuring the delegates that he will resubmit a comprehensive ban on nuclear testing to the Senate. That will make him even more beloved by the international body which is incapable of enforcing anything. Says one U.N. nuclear proliferation expert: "If the U.S. signs a treaty--even if we know it won't get through your Senate--it will trigger other nations to join it." Yes--Iran and North Korea will rush to sign it, and have no intention of abiding by it. But once a Chamberlain-like President signs it, only to have it rejected by the Senate, American can once again be marginalized for not being in the spirit of good nuclear policy. Obama becomes a hero and the United States becomes a pariah. What's not to like?

Once Obama has made his unchallenged predigested messiah-like speech on peace and "all of us just getting along," he's off to the diplomatic balls and receptions. There he will flash that toothy grin, accept the accolades of the peace-loving world community, and feast on caviar. He will once again be told how brilliant, how Christlike, how intelligent and brave he is. And the slightly-deflated and slightly shopworn ego (from being disrespected by all those boobs in America) will be once again inflated to the size of the Bullwinkle balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.

The Security Council: A President who just loves to be worshiped for each of his "firsts" will have another one on Thursday. He will be the first American President to preside over a meeting of the Security Council. As far as my research goes, I believe he's the first President even to attend a Security Council session. Without fanfare, he ordered his U.N. ambassador to alter the original agenda so that the subject is "nonproliferation" where the original agenda included direct references to Iran and North Korea, their violations of U.N. resolutions and shrugging-off of the weak and unenforceable U.N. sanctions. An Arab ambassador, who spoke not for attribution to the press said "I think he is very smart. President Clinton-smart, not just book-smart." When Clinton's popularity dropped below 50%, he had the "smarts" to recognize that it's not wise to push an agenda opposed by 50% to 60% of the American people. Obama continues to do so. So I beg to differ with the Arab delegate--on the record.

I covered this Security Council session and its agenda in some detail earlier, and if you would like to take a look at what Obama is planning, it's here: Obama at the Security Council.

Obama, The U.N. Security Council, and the European Missile Shield that Isn't: Did any of you think that the scrapping of the European anti-missile defense shield was a sudden decision? Anything's possible, but the two main issues to be discussed at the originally-proposed session on Thursday were nuclear non-proliferation (with specific reference to Iran and North Korea), and the delivery systems which accompany nuclear capability. The specifics of non-proliferation were deleted by Ambassador Susan Rice over two months ago at Obama's order, and the delivery systems were cut from the agenda entirely. So we will be treated to another happy-happy discussion of how naughty nukes are, and how we should all hold hands together and hope they go away. And in order to do so, Obama has proposed a nuclear disarmament treaty which doesn't specifically address Iran or North Korea. Kumbaya!

Now I understand fully that concurrence is not causation, but I have to be mighty suspicious of Obama's motives in tossing out the European missile defense system almost immediately preceding his second coronation at the United Nations. I have heard some crazy justifications for crazy actions by previous crazy U.S. administrations, but this one is the craziest. Justifying the scrapping of the plans to deploy anti-missile weapons in the Czech Republic and Poland, Obama National Security Adviser James L. Jones says that it was done because "Iran is further along than previously thought in developing medium-range missiles that could strike Western Europe and the Middle East with nuclear warheads."

If Jones had said that Iran was be farther behind than originally thought, I would have considered it overly-optimistic, but at least there would be some flawed logic justifying terminating, or at least delaying, the deployment. But determining that the threat is not only real, but more immediate, the Obama administration decided to scrap the project that could counter that threat. Did I miss something here?

So here's the justification: Jones says "We think they are heading toward weaponizing these missiles, which obviously we want to dissuade them from doing." That means we're going to dissuade them by eliminating our ability to stop the missiles before they can hit their targets. Alice--bring your looking glass! Jones also says there's an "ancillary benefit" of improving relations with Moscow (at the same time making Press Secretary Gibbs look unusually foolish because Gibbs said that the change was not about Russia the day before). "The fact is, there is clearly a relationship here in all of these issues. We are trying to reset the relationship with Russia, based on one of mutual respect and mutual interest." Old crocodile Russian President Putin is smiling with all his teeth showing. And just to put the frosting on the cake, Putin made it clear "we gave up nothing to obtain this change in American policy." It would have been a lot easier, more efficient and a lot less dangerous if Obama had just told Secretary of State Clinton to call Putin and Medvedev and tell them to push the red re-set button she gave them as a gift.

Under Obama, America is quickly becoming the "pitiful, helpless giant," or the "paper tiger" analogy that previous dictators used to describe America's unwillingness to use its military might to defend itself. And now our allies have been given the mucky end of the stick. Poland and the Czech Republic are already reconsidering their alliances with the United States based on their belief that America is not trustworthy and their proximity to a resurgent imperial Russia makes it dangerous to cast their lot with a weak and vacillating ally.

The final piece of illogic used by the Obama administration is that the shield was designed to intercept intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching the United States, and the Iranian missile are intermediate range ballistic missiles capable of reaching only Europe and points in the Mideast (Israel, anyone?). Well, let's throw the baby out with the bathwater. Instead of modifying the plan by adding IRBM anti-missile defenses to the mix, just throw out the whole plan. Brilliant.

I may be guessing wrong, but I am seeing a coordinated effort by the Obama administration to weaken America militarily, to tolerate Iranian bellicosity, and to mollify Russia in hopes that the former head of the KGB will take this so kindly as to give up his irredentist and expansionist plans. And all of this is underscored by Obama's unprecedented step of presiding over a Security Council session which will advance that effort.
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