Politics: Abortion and Downs

It appears that Dr. Cox really is a superhero. Here's a quote of his from a K-Lo article on NRO:

"[W]hen you have a child who was born with special needs, it's very confusing and disconcerting and you really don't know which end is up and you feel like you're from Mars and you did something wrong. It turns out that God blessed you with a really special package."

The K-Lo article itself is typical K-Lo. I agree with them but never find them extraordinarily illuminating. Nevertheless, her article is a rather handy reference for the earlier articles about abortion and Downs from the Washington Post. The elimination of Downs really is quite astounding and brings up important questions for the Pro-Choice movement, I feel. Abortion rights supporters might not be overly concerned with the end of Downs, but what if homosexuality is found to be both inborn and testable in the womb? Suddenly the abortion issue grows considerably more murky. K-Lo's conclusion is, perhaps, pertinent:

McGinley's son, Bauer's daughter — they are special packages for not just their parents, but for our culture. Their lives have the potential to save us from a Brave New Future that's not so much a brave world as it is a tragic assembly line, different need not apply.

A side note, why does Maria Eftimiades never even consider adoption?

Politics: Abortion

From an op-ed by Michael Kinsley:

No other nation obsesses about abortion the way we do. But many Americans believe that legalized abortion is government-sanctioned murder, or something close to it. And many others (including me) believe that forcing a woman to go through an unwanted pregnancy and childbirth is the most extreme unjustified government intrusion on personal freedom short of sanctioning murder.

Surely that's a bit much. Remember, no one is obligated to look after the child after he is born because of adoption. Kinsley must have a very limited imagination.

Politics: WFB

Happy Belated Birthday, WFB! He turned eighty on the 24th. The world is considerably better off thanks to him, as George Will so eloquently writes. My favorite quote from the article has to be:

Murray Kempton, the wonderful liberal columnist who later joined Buckley's eclectic legion of friends, wrote after Buckley's first news conference that the candidate "had the kidney to decline the usual humiliation of soliciting the love of the voters, and read his statement of principles in a tone for all the world that of an Edwardian resident commissioner reading aloud the 39 articles of the Anglican establishment to a conscript assemblage of Zulus." For conservatives, happy days were here again.

Religion: Chesterton on the Human Condition

A friend of mine reminded me of this quote from Orthodoxy this weekend. I don't think I have anything to say that could add to it:

We have all read in scientific books, and, indeed, in all romances, the story of the man who has forgotten his name. This man walks about the streets and can see and appreciate everything; only he cannot remember who he is. Well, every man is that man in the story. Every man has forgotten who he is. One may understand the cosmos, but never the ego; the self more distant than any star. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God; but thou shalt not know thyself. We are all under the same mental calamity; we have all forgotten our names. We have all forgotten what we really are. All that we call common sense and rationality and practicality and positivism only means that for certain dead levels of our life we forget that we have forgotten. All that we call spirit and art and ecstacy only means that for one awful instant we remember that we forget.

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

Let me preface this review by saying that I liked each of Harry Potter movies in the theater only to be bored out of my mind when I rented the first two for a second viewing. That being said, Goblet of Fire is clearly the best of the four.

I was especially impressed with the deft hand in the compression necessary in translating such a long book into an interesting movie. I feared the Quidditch World Cup could take half an hour or more, but Newell took the correct path in hardly dwelling on it at all. Also very clever was the removal of the Bertha Jorkins sub-plot. While her story would have improved the logical consistency of the movie, she wasn't what we call necessary. Finally, as much as it pains me, I'd like to applaud the decision to remove almost all classroom time. Painful, but necessary. Rita Skeeter was also handled exceptionally well.

As in any adaption of book to film, I have numerous minor quibbles. Hermione is far too pretty. The Ball scene loses a lot of its punch, when she's so good looking anyway. Also, do Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson have a thing for each other? Neither the script nor the books give any hint of it, but sometimes it appeared that Harry and Hermione like each other. While Hermione was too pretty, Fleur Delacour was not nearly pretty enough. Cutting out the Veela plotline was needed, but they didn't have to make her less attractive than Hermione. On a side note, I think it's time to stop dwelling upon the looks of a fifteen-year-old. Also, Krum and Cedric were to similar in temperament. I don't know why they couldn't have made Krum the ungainly outsider he is in the books. It would have made his character more memorable. I wish they could have included a glimpse of Bellatrix Lestrange at the trial, since she has rather a major part to play. Finally I thought the scene where Harry returns Cedric's body could have been a little less hurried.

Surprisingly enough, I only had two major complaints with Goblet of Fire. First, and most importantly, Dumbledore. For some reason Newell decided to do completely away with the slightly insane aspect of Dumbledore's personality. He also decided to ignore Dumbledore's majesty and calm. What we have left is a scared old man, who actually slams Harry into a pillar after he's named the fourth champion. He seems the most drastically changed character from the books. With little reason, I might add. Even Dumbledore's wisdom seems to suffer. Also, for the sake of suspense, I would have liked Nellew to have kept up the charade of Moody just a little longer. Although I already knew the plot, it seemed to me that Moody was marked as evil as soon as he dragged Harry away from Cedric's corpse.

For all that is lost in the transition from book to movie, there are some aspects to which the book just can't compare. The Goblet of Fire itself was far more impressive in the movie. There are so many wonders described in the book, that sometimes it's hard to realize just how marvelous some of the objects are. The initial sighting of the boat from Durmstrang was also impressive. The age (and experience) difference between Harry and the other three champions was also effectively demonstrated. I was very happy so see a well done CGI dragon. The Hungarian Horntail was the best dragon I've every seen. The special effects as a whole were one of the real strengths of the movie; something not true of the previous three. Finally, I think Ralph Fiennes did an absolutely wonderful job as Voldemort.

If you haven't seen Goblet of Fire yet, definitely go. This is an experience you don't want to miss on the big screen.

Sports: College FB Top 10

1. USC
2. Texas
3. Ohio State
4. Penn State
5. Auburn
6. Notre Dame
7. LSU
8. Georgia
9. VA Tech
10. Miami

Once again, I'm ranking these teams based purely upon who I think are the best teams right now. Also, to keep myself honest, I've voted for these same ten teams in ESPN's Fan Poll: Rank 'Em. Why isn't Oregon on the list? I don't have any faith in the play of their lines. The PAC 10 isn't exactly famous for its physicality. Two thin ND lines pushed around USC for 60 minutes., which incidentally should give Texas hope. Is Auburn going to get screwed again? Yes. Why are the pollsters so impressed with LSU and VA Tech? I really have no idea.

Video Game Review: Shadowlords and Dreamcatcher

Shadowlords and Dreamcatcher are both independently created campaigns to played with the PC game Neverwinter Nights. I had many small problems with both the storylines and the technical workings of the two campaigns; however, I refuse to dwell on them in face of such an astounding achievement.

I really cannot stress how disappointed I was with the storyline in Neverwinter Nights. After my experience with the Baldur's Gate series, I expected something of similar quality. Instead, there were mediocre 3D graphics, poor art design, henchman instead of companions, and boring and tortuous plot. Shadowlords and Dreamcatcher are head and shoulders above the Official Campaign. Your henchman is actually a real character, and the plot moves briskly along with a fair number of decent twists and turns. If you own Neverwinter Nights, I highly suggest downloading these campaigns. They'll make you feel like you've finally received your money's worth. If you don't own the game, I'd only suggest buying it if you are absolutely starved for a good RPG. You'd be better off waiting for Neverwinter Nights II.

Politics: Evolution vs. I.D.

Here's a selection from Krauthammer's excellent column that just about sums up my feelings on the subject:

Let's be clear. Intelligent design may be interesting as theology, but as science it is a fraud. It is a self-enclosed, tautological "theory" whose only holding is that when there are gaps in some area of scientific knowledge -- in this case, evolution -- they are to be filled by God. It is a "theory" that admits that evolution and natural selection explain such things as the development of drug resistance in bacteria and other such evolutionary changes within species but also says that every once in a while God steps into this world of constant and accumulating change and says, "I think I'll make me a lemur today." A "theory" that violates the most basic requirement of anything pretending to be science -- that it be empirically disprovable. How does one empirically disprove the proposition that God was behind the lemur, or evolution -- or behind the motion of the tides or the "strong force" that holds the atom together?

I grouped this under politics, by the way, if didn't follow the link, because Krauthammer is writing about the ridiculous Kansas situation.

Book Review: The Thing Why I Am a Catholic

I finished this book last week, but it's taken me a while to collect my thoughts. As with any book by Chesterton, there's a lot going on here. One reading, which is all I've really had time for, is rarely enough background to provide a really insightful analysis. Nevertheless, I'll do the best that I can.

First, the layout Chesterton chose for the book is not one that I generally approve of. Rather than a book with a single argument, The Thing is a series of articles connected only by their defense of Catholicism. Without an overarching theme, these articles could be rearranged with little hurt to the integrity of the volume.

With the preliminaries out of the way, The Thing really is typical Chesterton: almost always brilliant but often maddening. As the illustrious Mr. Jas. Brennan recently told me: "He never lets the facts get in the way of an argument." This pithy saying again rings true. Chesterton will undoubtedly always seem a little dated due to his seemingly irrational opposition to evolution. He claims, both in The Thing and in other works, that he has no objections to the theory per se; however, it is abundantly clear that he loves tweaking the nose of the liberal establishment and will do so at every turn, thus his continued opposition. I really could do without "If They Had Believed" as well, the argument Chesteron insists on making there is tendetious at best. Also somewhat maddening is Chesterton's journalistic style of philosophy. Points are often buried with paragraphs, while frequent references to contemporary persons and events often make what are clearly brutal salvos completely incomprehensible. Part of the problem undoubtedly rests in my reading of an ancient version of The Thing; however, the recent edition of Orthodoxy by Ignatius Press did not exactly contain copious footnotes. This lack of textual scholarship is probably a difficulty we will be forced to live with for the near future.

On to the brilliant. Chapter Two, "The Skeptic as Critic," is a devastating attack on the then current literary establishment that is still sorely needed. Chesterton, I think, convincingly shows, that if a critic holds no values absolute, then he ceases to be a critic. I think that we can take Chesterton's argument and apply it to the banes that are post-modernism and multiculturalism. Other worthy chapters include "Is Humanism a Religion?" where Chesterton shows that a lack of first principles mean the doom of Humanism and "The Drift from Domesticity," where Chesterton argues that true freedom lies in the preservation of the family. "The Call to the Barbarians" is also rather worth reading, as Chesterton mocks the absurdity of the Nordic Superman. "The Hat and the Halo," "The Protestant Superstitions," "The Slavery of the Mind," "The Suicide as Optimist," "The Idols of Scotland," "Peace and the Papacy," and "The Spirit of Christmas" are all gems. The astute reader will have realized by now that I have exercised considerable restraint in not quoting the ever-quotable Chesterton; however, this restraint cannot go on forever. First, I'd like to highlight his broadside against those people who insist on taking only what they personally want from the Gospels while demonizing the rest, all the while outside the rubric of organized religion:

If a school of critics were found prepared to pay divine honours to a certain person while doubting whether he was divine, men who took off their hats in his churches while denying that he was present on his altars, who hinted that he was only a religious teacher and then hinted again that he must be served as if he were the only teacher of religion; who are always ready to treat him as a fallible individual in relation to his rivals, and then to invoke him as an infallible authority against his followers, who dismiss every text they choose to think dogmatic and then gush over every text they choose to think amiable, who heckle him with Higher Criticism about three-quarters of what he said and then grovel before a mawkish and unmanly ideal made by misunderstanding the little which is left--if there were a school of critics in this relation to a historical character, we might very well admit that they were not getting to grips with it, but surrounding it with "a halo of false sentiment."

Second, in "The Protestant Superstitions" Chesterton manages to put into exquisite prose the problems I have with practicing Christians who deny the Real Presence in the Eucharist:

The whole point of this last position might be expressed in the line of M. Cammaerts's beautiful little poem about bluebells; le ciel est tombe par terre. Heaven has descended into the world of matter; the supreme spiritual power is now operating by the machinery of matter, dealing miraculously with the bodies and souls of men. It blesses all the five senses; as the senses of the baby are blessed at a Catholic christening. It blesses even material gifts and keepsakes, as with relics or rosaries. It works through water or oil or bread or wine. Now that sort of mystical materialism may please or displease the Dean, or anybody else. But I cannot for the life of me understand why the Dean, or anybody else, does not see that the Incarnation is as much a part of that idea as the Mass; and that the Mass is as much a part of that idea as the Incarnation. A Puritan may think it blasphemous that God should become a wafer. A Moslem thinks it blasphemous that God should become a workman in Galilee. And he is perfectly right, from his point of view; and given his primary principle. But if the Moslem has a principle, the Protestant has only a prejudice. That is, he has only a fragment; a relic; a superstition. If it be profane that the miraculous should descend to the plane of matter, then certainly Catholicism is profane; and Protestantism is profane; and Christianity is profane. Of all human creeds or concepts, in that sense, Christianity is the most utterly profane. But why a man should accept a Creator who was a carpenter, and then worry about holy water, why he should accept a local Protestant tradition that God was born in some particular place mentioned in the Bible, merely because the Bible had been left lying about in England, and then say it is incredible that a blessing should linger on the bones of a saint, why he should accept the first and most stupendous part of the story of Heaven on Earth, and then furiously deny a few small but obvious deductions from it--that is a thing I do not understand; I never could understand; I have come to the conclusion that I shall never understand. I can only attribute it to Superstition.

Finally, I'll leave you with Chesterton's take on Emerson, certainly the best I've ever read:

A Puritan tried to be a Pagan; and succeeded in being a Pagan who hesitated about whether he ought to go and see a girl dancing.

The Thing is definitely worth your time in reading. Chesterton is one of the masters of English prose. Even if you disagree with him philosophically, he is still eminently enjoyable. However, if you are new to Chesterton, I would start with Orthodoxy or The Everlasting Man. These two are his masterworks and best explain him philosophically.

Sports: College FB Top 10

Just so you know that I'm putting my money where my mouth is, I placed these teams in the exact order posted here as my Top 10 in ESPN's Fan Poll: College Football Top 25.

1. USC
2. Texas
3. Ohio State
4. Penn State
5. Notre Dame
6. Auburn
7. LSU
8. Miami
9. VA Tech
10. Georgia

These rankings are based upon whom I think are the best teams right now. I don't really know the proper criterion for ranking college teams without the presence of some kind of playoff. Since a playoff remains a pipe-dream, I think it best to go with current ability rather than some nebulous amalgam of current ability mixed with record.

Book Review: Knife of Dreams

Knife of Dreams is the eleventh book in Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series. If you're not already familar with the series, good luck reading this post.

First things first. This book is Jordans best since Lord of Chaos, though I would peg Crown of Swords just behind it. The Mat storyline finally picked up again with excellent results, though his reunion with the Band could have been better handled. I really enjoyed seeing him plot battles again. I found Tuon's recognition of this being Mat's calling highly ironic, as Robert Jordan for some reason decided to take that aspect away from Mat since Lord of Chaos. On a side note, Mat's comment about his being "a new kind of war" was simply ludicrous. Why does everyone act as if he's the first commander too not help the enemy wounded? Simply ludicrous. Rand's storyline is also interesting, as it always is, but far too short. I don't know why Jordan spends so little time with his protagonist. Lews Therin finally taking control of the Source was much appreciated as was an explanation of Rand's sickness when siezing saidin. I found Egwene's chapters surprisingly readable. I doubt I'll ever really like her character, but she was actually doing something this time around. How strange! I also found Nyneave's single chapter amazing and not just because she was limited to a single chapter. I don't think the writing was particularly well done, but that didn't seem to matter too much. I guess I'm just a sucker for doomed marches.

Not all of Jordan's plotlines fared so well. Elayne finally gains control of Andor, but her chapters remain the most boring in the entire series. I actually skipped her chapters until I was finished with the characters--the first time I've ever done this with a Wheel of Time book. Faile finished a close second to Elayne in terms of being a bone-numbing, hair-pulling bore. Luckily Perrin finally rescues her, ending the three book odyssey that no one really cared about. I really miss Perrin. He lost his soul immediately after The Shadow Rising and hasn't reclaimed it yet. Maybe being around Mat and Rand will help. How did Jordan make such a great character completely completely useless?

Unfortunately Jordan did not succeed in pulling his story out of the morass that this series has become. He swears that this next book will be his last, but unless he pulls a really cheap trick (Hey, all we needed to do to defeat the Dark One was count to one hundred backwards!) I'm envisioning a 1,300 page book. There's still just so much to do. I really wished Jordan had managed to keep himself in hand after Fires of Heaven. Up to that point, while getting longer, the books managed to be tightly woven with Jordan remaining firmly in control. With Lord of Chaos, the threads began to unravel. He continued to add character after character, each demanding a viewpoint of his own. Why the reader should care what a Windfinder thinks is beyond me. Crown of Swords, Path of Daggers, Winter's Heart, and Crossroads of Twilight were all too short and too meandering. The only real matters of import occurring in the four of them were the defeat of Sammael and the cleansing of saidin. I really think that Jordan took far too much time with these four and is now rushing to finish off the series. Based on where we are on the series, I would advocate two more books to ensure the tying up of all loose threads. If he had managed to be more economical with his words, this series really could have been finished in eleven volumes.

If you haven't read Wheel of Time, I don't suggest reading it until you've become acquainted with The Prince of Nothing by R. Scott Bakker and A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin. Both series are much darker than Wheel of Time but are also far superior in terms of writing. I don't want to disparge Wheel of Time too much though. The first six books really are excellent, though perhaps this is my adolescent memory speaking with a hint of nostalgia. Being as it may, there really aren't that many fantasy series from which to choose. Jordan's work definitely belongs in the top ten. If you're already enmeshed in Wheel of Time, you might as well ride it out, though with full knowledge that the series gets progressively worse.

Music Review: Kashmir

In my eternal search for songs to fill my iPod, I came across an old CD that I hadn't listened to in years: Kashmir: The Symphonic Led Zeppelin composed Jaz Coleman. Hearing it again, I am reminded why it had remained forgotten for so long. Some of the songs are definitely pleasant to listen to: "Kashmir" works pretty well, as do "Stairway to Heaven" and "Battle of Evermore," "When the Levee Breaks" is the best of the lot, while "Friends," "Going to California," and "All My Love" are forgettable. The problem with each of these songs is that they rely too heavily on their source material. I am not exactly a connoisseur of classical music, but I imagine that the percussion used in "When the Levee Breaks" is scarcely traditional. Where Coleman's rendition of "Levee" really soars is the part of the song that mirrors the original piece when Plant sings:

Don't it make you feel bad,
When you're tryin' to find your way home,
You don't know which way to go?
If you're goin' down South
They got no work to do,
If you don't know about Chicago.

Here Coleman really lets it all go with the strings and horns almost talking with each other. He doesn't just mirror the original "Levee." He uses it as a template and then forges boldly ahead. His redition of guitar solo from "Stairway" is a failure because he refuses to simlarly let go. The result is unsatisfying as it an almost note for note translation of a part of a song that sounds far better on the instruments it was meant to be performed on. I fail to see the value in an orchestra playing to the strengths of an electric guitar.

Politics: Problems Inherent in the International System

It is, perhaps, fitting for the inaugural real post of this blog to be graced with some lines from the magnificent G. K. Chesterton. Here we have his comments on the inherent difficulties of setting up a workable international system:

It is the weakness of many worthy and well-meaning attempts at international justice just now, that the international council can hardly help being merely a microcosm or model of the world outside it, with all its little things and big things, including the things that are much too big. Suppose that in the international interchanges of the future some power, say Sweden, is felt to be disproportionate or problematical. If Sweden is powerful in Europe, she will be powerful in the council of Europe. If Sweden is too powerful in Europe, she will be too powerful in the council of Europe. And because she is the very thing that is irresistable, she is the very thing to be resisted; or at any rate to be restrained. I do not see how Europe can ever escape from that logical dilemma, except by discovering again an authority that is purely moral and is the recognized custodian of a morality. The Thing, p. 246.

After spending due time contemplating the words of the Master, we can then turn to relevance. One of the main problems with the UN, in my mind, is not that it includes dictatorships, kleptocracies, etc. (afterall, there must be some forum in which all countries can intereact), but that it insists on according every country with the same respect. Thus we have the ridiculous situation where countries with a less than spotless track record on human rights (Tunisia, China, North Korea, etc.) are allowed to set up a UN conference for the alleged purpose of expanding the availability of the internet to their respective peoples while in reality they mean to find a way to clamp down on the internet as efficiently as possible. Now everyone knows this is the case, but there goes Kofi Annan tootling around just as if America, the UK, and Germany suddenly decided to give half of their tax revenues to shore up Sierra Leone.

Chesterton wanted a recognized moral authority. Tongue in cheek, he puts forward the Pope. Not that I think that's necessarily a bad idea, but it may be just a tad impractical. What I'd really like would be some sort of world body halfway between NATO and the UN--an organization for countries of general good will. Not much more chance then acknowledging the authority of the Pope, but there it is.

So it begins . . .