George Will the Democrat

In his latest column, George Will calls on his readers to vote for the Democrats in November.  Less than a month after he heaped praise on Mitch McConnell's recent achievements - made possible because Republicans control both houses of Congress and the Presidency, he demands that it be torn down.  Yes, the Zero Tolerance Policy on the border - where the laws are finally being enforced as they were written - is a demonstration of bad government.  Hmm.

 

Though I dislike much of Trump's style, his results have been nothing short of amazing.  Regulations rolled back, conservative justices, tax reductions, economic growth, improved employment numbers, unbelievable shifts in the Korean Peninsula and the Middle East.  Jerusalem recognized as capitol of Israel (something the previous 3 presidents said they would do), women can drive in Saudi Arabia, and there may soon by a railway link between Israel and Saudi Arabia.  I have been an avid reader of George Will for years; policies that he has advocated for decades are being enacted and he is furious.

 

It should be noted that Will references a recent incident where Corey Lewandowski - Trump's former campaign manager - dismissively said "Wah, wah," when confronted with a story of a Down syndrome child separated from her parents at the border.  George Will's son has Down syndrome.  Trump may be implementing policies that Will should like but Trump is not at all presidential in the common usage of the term.  Trump is a Washington outsider while George Will has been an insider for most of his life.  If Trump had the demeanor of Romney and was accomplishing these same things, I suspect Will would be far more supportive.  Clash of personalities more than policies.

Due Process Not Required to Stop Crime in Progress

In a recent tweet, Trump said, "We cannot allow all of these people to invade our Country. When somebody comes in, we must immediately, with no Judges or Court Cases, bring them back from where they came."  Of course, this has resulted in panic and hysteria.  But let's look at this a little differently.

One day, you come home to find that Walter has setup a tent in your backyard.  You call the police and ask them to remove him because he is trespassing.  The police arrive and say they will not remove him without due process.  So, Walter gets to continue trespassing in your backyard for as long as it takes for a court date.  Illegal aliens are trespassers.  Taking them off the property necessarily means kicking them out of the country.  As it happens, there are US Consulates in Matamoros (across Rio Grande from Brownsville, TX), Nuevo Laredo (across Rio Grande from Laredo, TX), Ciudad Juarez (across Rio Grande from El Paso, TX), Nogales (across the border from Nogales, AZ), and Tijuana (across the border from San Diego, CA).  Drop them at the nearest one and let them make their case.  If you reward trespassers by letting them continue to trespass at your expense, you are encouraging more trespassers.

 

Do we let the drunk driver continue to drive until his day in court?  In Texas, the driver's license can be confiscated on the spot.  In the case of trespassers, they are escorted off the property.  In this case, the property is US soil.  If that was government policy, we wouldn't need a wall.

Supreme Legislature Writes Tax Law

In South Dakota v. Wayfair, the Supreme Court - in its infinite wisdom - decided that ecommerce had reached such a level that it was unfair for brick and mortar stores to pay sales taxes while internet companies did not.  Though I agree that it is unfair, that is a legislative matter.  The court doesn't get to change policy because the economy has changed.  This new ruling is going to create far more trouble than it solves.  If anything, it might nix a lot of ecommerce as companies refuse to do business with a vast number of localities with differing tax structures.

It is one thing for Texas to require Texas-based companies to collect sales taxes for all sales within the state, but now Texas can require Alaska-based companies to collect Texas sales taxes for internet purchases and forward it to Austin.  Alaskans will be conscripted as tax collectors for a state where they are not represented.  Hmm, taxation without representation?

 

The way to do this would be to have citizens required to report out of state purchases and pay the tax.  Of course, there is no way the citizens would approve such a law.  It is easier for state governments to strong-arm thousands of businesses than millions of citizens, especially since many of those citizens have a negative view of business.

 

Such consequential changes in tax law should not be made by a 5 - 4 majority of lawyers.  The appropriate answer should have been to refer South Dakota to Congress to change the laws.

A Year from Today?

You think it's funny today but in the not too distant future it might be a hate crime to specify mother or father.

Early Man

It is the Stone Age and a meteor comes down in sight of a band of cavemen.  The meteor smashes a dueling T-Rex and triceratops, placing this in a highly-fictionalized version of the Stone Age.  Clearly, this is a call back to One Million Years B.C., especially since the dinosaurs are credited as Ray and Harry (Ray Harryhausen).  The cavemen recover the meteor at the bottom of a huge crater and find it is hot.  Hot potato!  After tossing it around, they soon start to kick it back and forth.  Moments later, football (American Soccer) is invented.

Generations later, cavemen still live in the crater that is now a lush valley home for a band of rabbit hunters.  Hmm, call back to Curse of the Were-Rabbit?  Dug (Eddie Redmayne) is an ambitious youth who hopes to convert the tribe to hunting woolly mammoths.  Life is placid in the valley until Lord Nooth (Tom Hiddleston) arrives on his bronze-armored mammoths.  He and his Bronze Age goons evict the cavemen from the valley.  Through convoluted plotting and chance encounters, the cavemen are given the opportunity to reclaim their valley if they defeat the football champions of the Bronze Age city.  They have two weeks to train.

 

Having recently read a book on the Bronze Age collapse, I was annoyed by much of this movie.  Yes, it's for kids but ahistorical nonsense always grates.  Toilet paper, coin money, domesticated woolly mammoths, books, and a giant mallard duck with shark-teeth all detracted from the setting.  Mostly, this is a film for football fans, with in-jokes and football silliness.  It is far beneath the genius of Wallace and Gromit.  Even Chicken Run was more entertaining.  The weakest Aardman Animation by far.  Maybe football (Soccer) fans will enjoy it.

Hereditary

Hereditary opens with a family heading to a funeral for Annie's mother.  Annie (Toni Collette) gives a eulogy that outlines her very difficult relationship with her secretive mother.  It is a eulogy that makes you wonder why she even bothered.  Annie is an artist.  She makes miniature houses complete with furniture and people.  She has a bad habit of creating scenes from her life in miniature, which adds a creepy vibe to the movie and gives an insight to Annie's mental state.

 

Steve (Gabriel Byrne) is Annie's husband.  He's a solid fellow who is somehow coping with an increasingly unstable wife and grief-stricken family.  Peter (Alex Wolf) is the older child, a pot-smoking flake who is lost and directionless.  Charlie (Milly Shapiro) is the younger child and she is obviously not quite right.  She makes dark art, thinks nothing of dismembering a dead bird, and is hardest hit by her grandmother's death.

 

There are some scary moments but mostly it is predictable drivel.  The characters are too often blind to the obvious and march straight to their well-deserved doom.  There are parts that make no sense.  What hospital would send an unconscious youth home with his parents who then proceed to carry them between them like a sack of potatoes?  Why is Peter constantly on his cell phone early in the movie but, when things go sideways, he has no phone?  All cell phones just vanish in the later half of the film because that would be too easy.  The ending is reminiscent of The Witch, where the forces of evil triumph and the last member of the family numbly accepts it.  And that is weird too.  If the end was the goal, some of the scares and incidents of the middle become counter-productive.

Skip this one.

The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951)

The Day the Earth Stood Still opens with an unidentified aircraft flying at supersonic speed around the world.  It finally lands on a baseball field in Washington DC.  The military is soon on hand and circles the flying saucer and awaits developments.  After a couple of hours, Klaatu (Michael Rennie) emerges and declares that he comes in peace.  As he tries to deliver a gift, a soldier panics and shoots him.  Gort (Lock Martin), a mute robot, emerged and commenced to disintegrate weapons - rifles, tanks, artillery (why are artillery pieces here?) - but not the soldiers.  Klaatu calls the robot off and the military transports Klaatu to Walter Reed Hospital.

 

Klaatu has come to Earth to warn against aggression.  He declares that the galaxy has been indifferent to Earth's internal squabbles but that the advent of atomic weapons has the galaxy troubled.  Earth needs to embrace the peace-loving ways of Klaatu's people or risk extermination.  That was a rather peculiar formulation.  Be peaceful like us or we will commit genocide to protect ourselves from your violent ways.  Huh?  Amazingly, despite the obvious superiority of Klaatu's technology, the government decides to keep him locked in a hospital room while denying him the opportunity to deliver the riot act to Earth.

 

Klaatu escapes and decides he needs to learn more about humans.  Under the assumed name of Mr. Carpenter, he rents a room where he meets Helen (Patricia Neal) and her son, Bobby (Billy Gray).  One of the funniest scenes in the movie was when Tom (Hugh Marlowe), Helen's boyfriend, eagerly accepts Mr. Carpenter's offer to babysit.  Klaatu's day out with Bobby is done amazingly well.  The visits to the Lincoln Memorial and Arlington Cemetery show great affect on Klaatu; maybe humans aren't so bad.

 

There are a couple of oddities that are hard to accept.  The willingness to kill an alien from a vastly superior civilization is truly short-sighted.  Imprisoning or killing an ambassador is typically viewed as an act of war.  This was particularly reckless after the power of Gort was demonstrated.  Then there is the strangeness that Klaatu's people are worried about Earthly nukes.  At this time, we hadn't even gotten a satellite into orbit but they seem to think an atomic bomb might find its way to another solar system in the near future?  Talk about an abundance of caution.

 

A very enjoyable movie that stands up surprisingly well even 67 years later.  Thumbs up.

Right to Refuse Business

The Supreme Court has ruled (7 to 2) in favor of the baker who refused to bake a cake for a gay wedding.  Those who are pleased by the ruling proclaim a victory for religious liberty.  Those against the ruling liken it to blacks not being seated in restaurants.  Though I like the result, I don't much care for the religious liberty reasoning.  I'm more of an extremist.

 

All transactions between private people must be consensual.  If Nazi Nick doesn't want to service Jews in his business, the government should not force him to do so.  If Klansman Keith doesn't want African American patrons in his business, then he should have the right to refuse service.  Of course, this works both ways.  Jews and African American business owners can refuse service to Nazis and Klansmen.  Government is a different matter.  The State of Alabama or the City of New York must treat all people equally.  As such, the Civil War, the Civil Rights Movement, Votes for Women, and so forth were absolutely required.  Government is disallowed from being a racist or a bigot but it cannot criminalize that in its citizens.  The correct way to purge racism, bigotry, sexism, and other prejudices is through private ostracism.  That is a long and slow process.  It is so much quicker to pummel the racist and sexist bigots with the coercive government.  Barry Goldwater voted against the 1964 Civil Rights Act because it criminalized the right of private individuals to choose to do business or not do business with whomever they chose.  People should be free to be miserable human beings.  Forced virtue is no virtue at all.  That's a hard argument to sell and is partly why Goldwater was obliterated in the 1964 election.

 

As Ron Paul said in his farewell address to the House of Representatives, freedom is a hard sell:

 

I have thought a lot about why those of us who believe in liberty, as a solution, have done so poorly in convincing others of its benefits. If liberty is what we claim it is- the principle that protects all personal, social and economic decisions necessary for maximum prosperity and the best chance for peace- it should be an easy sell. Yet, history has shown that the masses have been quite receptive to the promises of authoritarians which are rarely if ever fulfilled.

 

As Jefferson may have said (it has often been attributed to him), "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance."  Vigilance is hard work.  The promises of politicians to do all the hard work for the citizens is enticing.  It is laborious and time consuming to debate the racists and the sexists and the bigots while it is comparatively easy to pass a law and sic the cops on them.  Sure, that punishes the bad think, but it doesn't reform them but rather hardens their prejudices.

 

With our current technology, such laws are mostly unneeded.  No law was required to cudgel Starbucks in the wake of apparent racism.  The company folded almost immediately.  Ditto for a bakery in Portland that refused to service a black women who arrived after the store was closed; employees were fired here.  Though I think the businesses were justified in both cases, private citizen outrage resulted in immediate action by those businesses.  In this atmosphere, just try to be a racist business owner.

 

The baker may have won the ruling but I highly doubt he will have great success in his future baking endeavors.  Everyone knows who he is and he will most likely lose more business from those who think he's a bigot than he will get from those who think he's a hero.  And that is how you change society.

George Will Puts Humble Pie in the Oven

A recent article by George Will celebrates the long game of Mitch McConnell.  McConnell is now the longest serving Republican Senate Majority Leader, surpassing Bob Dole.  Though many criticize McConnell for being a milquetoast, he is reshaping the judiciary.  Will lists several of McConnell's recent accomplishments:

 

1. Largest tax reduction in 31 years

2. Increased defense spending

3. Repeal of many Dodd-Frank banking rules

4. Drilling allowed in ANWR after 38 years of being blocked

5. Reshaping NLRB, which had been a source of mischief during the Obama years

6. Extensive use of the Congressional Review Act to repeal regulations

 

Wow, Mitch McConnell is really amazing!  However, I notice that all of his great accomplishments seem to have come in the last 16 months.  What changed in the last 16 months that allowed Mitch to play his 'long game' so well?  Oddly, President Trump is not mentioned once in the article.

Will cannot fail to notice that much of his preferred conservative policy has been implemented during the administration of a man he vociferously denounced.  He left the Republican Party because Speaker Ryan endorsed the man who won the party's nomination.  Gee, George, I left the party when George W Bush dramatically expanded government in his first term, abandoning any pretense of conservatism.  Where were you?  If Trump continues to implement conservative policies and nominate conservative judges that allow Mitch to reshape the judiciary (I do love how Will gives McConnell all the credit for approving and ignores Trump's more important role of nominating), Will will take his humble pie out of the oven and eat it.