The Kingdom of Infinite Space by Raymond Tallis

It was the title that seduced me. "The Kingdom of Infinite Space" - subtitled "A portrait of your head". Yet it was not the exploration of the mind-brain duality that I'd presumed. No, the book is unfortunately more of a novelty act - a treatise on the head that attempts to ignore the brain as much as humanly possible. This leaves the reader dealing with a polemic of the various inputs and outputs of the heads. Sounds, sights, touches, tastes and smells vie for attention with mucus, saliva, ear wax, and tears. All that was missing was an ode to a pimple.

Mr. Tallis is also an earnest philosopher who shyly disguises his thoughts behind silly chapter titles like "A first truly philosophical digression" or the like. Combined with his penchant for incomprehensible (to me) Briticisms and unavoidable "heady" puns, it becomes hard to take his writing seriously. Apart from a semi-passionate (and thus semi-entertaining) rant left for the last chapter on the "location of thought", this book truly headed off in mostly wrong directions.

The Visitor

The Visitor is a small indie film that adeptly examines the theme suggested by its spare title from a couple of different levels. There is the college professor who has given up on living, he's merely visiting his life. And then there's the refugees in the U.S.A., hoping for a chance at a better life, but relegated to a surreal limbo-like existence, outside of the official bureaucracy.

Richard Jenkins stars as the barely alive college professor - inspired casting given his experience as the spiritual dad in the classic tv series, Six Feet Under. What kind of actor, by the way, takes a role in a series where his character is killed off in the first scene? Okay, granted, his ghostly presence made regular on-screen returns, but still.

Unknown to the professor, a refugee couple have rented out his Manhattan apartment (we never find out why exactly he maintains an apartment in NYC which he rarely visits - something to do with his late wife, we presume). The professor shows up for a conference. Surprise! Surprise! But he lets the couple stay. Tarek is from Syria - a musician specializing in African drum - a form of music that captivates the professor and gradually re-invigorates the professor's life - that and a visit from the Tarek's mother.

To its credit, the movie does not engage in any heavy-handed proselytism of the evils of the refugee process. It simply presents the refugees as people - and lets the circumstance and treatment speak for itself. "Everything changed after 9-11," one character remarks. Perhaps, but there has to be a better way to address the plight of these human beings.

Doubt

The film, Doubt, based on the play of the same name written by John Patrick Shanley, tackles a controversial topic by shrouding it in layers of uncertainty and, of course, doubt. The storyline contrasts the dagger of suspicion against the presumption of innocence. Yet, by choosing such a button-pushing subject, the purported sexual abuse of an altar boy by a Catholic priest, the author casts illumination on his theme, while simultaneously introducing complexities that deflect from the central issue. Questions of race and motherhood, spreading an implication that the boy - and thereby accusing all such victims - brought the abuse upon himself.

"It's his character," the mother defends and lashes out in the same breath, "just leave it alone, let him graduate in six months."

This melodrama - unbelievable and socially unacceptable, yet tugging at threads of race and impoverished hope - highlights another problem with this story. It is a not a piece of fiction for fans of subtle intricate plots - no, the archetypes are front and center, the contrasts obvious, the dialogue rising to a crescendo at the end of every scene. The cold wind blows through doors and windows left ajar, a disapproving god chilling the hearts of his wayward servants, lost and full of doubt.

On the positive side, this filmic adaptation of the original play is visually stunning, making the most of the change in medium. And the acting is stellar - Meryl Streep inhabits the role of the morally superior nun with headstrong certainty (at least until the final scene), while Philip Seymour Hoffman portrays the priest with a believable combination of sanctimony and not-quite-innocent vulnerability.

Burn after Reading

Finally, an intelligent comedy that engenders some real laughs. Burn after Reading is a dark, sarcastic take on the internal workings of the CIA. Created from the warped minds of the Coen brothers, the film alternates between absurdist reality and out-of-control hilarity. Imagine the movie Get Smart if the Coen brothers had been given control. J.K. Simmons is perfectly cast as the incredulous upper management type (e.g. the Chief), while John Malkovitch rages as the intellectually pompous (and alcoholic) ex-agent whose firing triggers the ridiculously simple plot. The only false step is provided by Brad Pitt whose over-the-top portrayal of a semi-moronic fitness instructor reminded me too much of his tick-ridden psych inmate from the classic Twelve Monkees.

The death of the novel

Just as Nietzsche declared that God is dead, and Fukuyama proclaimed the End of History, the death of fiction (at least in form of the written word) is upon us. The short story is long gone, poetry rendered irrelevant without a backing beat, and now the novel as a piece of art is relegated to the trash heap of history - though, since history is done, the meaning of this is unclear.

We're talking about the literary novel, of course, a form of long-winded expression that is capable of describing a moment in human civilization, of circling and enveloping and describing in detail the arc of a people, from birth to death, from passionate love to saturated hate, from selfless sacrifice to narcissistic obsession, from the dregs of slavery to the glory of freedom, from the horrors of war to the whispered soliloquy of peace.

This means that the literary novelist is an obsolete figure. Lament the disappearance of Dickens, Dostoevsky, of Camus and Tolstoy, even Twain and Hemmingway. We will never see their like again.

Yet the panderings to the mass-market, the populist fare that somehow captivates the

appetite of the multitudes with its nutrition-free offerings, survive and prosper.

But the success of the pop-literati is not the full story. Somehow the examination of the large issues

in life, be they philosophical, political, economic, scientific or ethical, have been relegated to the non-fiction aisles (nonwithstanding the James Frey pseudo-controversy). Fiction, as they teach us, is all about personal stories - alive with peculiar detail of the lives of these fabricated characters - in order that we can identify, so that we can delve with vicarious pleasure into these

fictional realms. As a result, however, the fiction lacks the social context to deal with, in a meaningful manner,

the issues of the day.

Of course, my musings are not original. Ironically they were repeated recently in a Globe and Mail article describing the Infinite Summer blog, created by a group of people who've dedicated their summer to reading the novel 'Infinite Jest' by David Foster Wallace. This book is revered by some as a modern classic, a thousand page plus tome (with copious footnoted asides) that rivals the masterworks mentioned above.

Perhaps this was the last NOVEL ever written. Certainly, it was the last novel by this author - he committed suicide while attempting to write a followup.

I suppose I should read it then. If only I had an infinite summer.

Crime and Punishment?

What deters a would-be criminal? One's own conscience, for a start. Obviously, that's not always enough. The fear of getting caught, of getting arrested, of disappointing the people who love you, of being ostracized by society at large.

In order to deter crime effectively, punishment needs to be "sure, swift and severe". Cesare Beccaria codified this philosophy in the 18th century. Yet even he realized that the "severe" component of this trilogy had the weakest impact. Punishment needs to be severe enough to loom in the mind (i.e. not just a slap on the wrist), but any increase in severity will have no measurable impact on future deterrence.

Of course, the justice system in our modern society continues to put emphasis on the severity of its punishments, increasing the length of prison sentences, despite the ineffectiveness of this course of action. In fact, it is counter-productive. Prisons are over-crowded, judges become reluctant to hand out effective sentences to "first-time offenders". Punishment is no longer "sure", in fact it is very avoidable if one has a good lawyer. Add to that the typical delays of the court system, and the swiftness of punishment becomes a joke.

A recent New Yorker article (Don't Shoot, June 22, 2009) describes a program designed to curb gang violence and public drug sales by focusing police actions. Rather than the typical maneuver of arresting one or two people (who are sure to be released in a day or two), the police will adopt a policy of zero-tolerance. The police will target all dealers, all gang members, and arrest everyone complicit. This will happen every time a crime is committed. There will be no letting up. The vital component of this program is convincing the gangs that the police will seriously apply its provisions - that punishment will be swift and inescapable. And it works despite the fact the severity of this punishment is unchanged.

Quantum of Solace

After an auspicious rebirth of James Bond in 2006's Casino Royale,  featuring a buff and tough Daniel Craig in the iconic role, the follow-up film Quantum of Solace unfortunately returns to a more familiar Bondian formula.  Though Craig still channels a down and dirty Bond - emerging from various dire scrapes with more cuts and bruises than Demi Moore's ex in a Quentin Tarantino flick - with a soiled yet functional tuxedo, the movie is little more than a sequence of grandiose chase scenes.  And the over-the-top villain is back, an environmentalist anti-hero subtly named Mr. Green (making me think that the movie would culminate in the library with a candlestick). 

Ostensibly, the plot features Bond out to avenge the girlfriend killed in the previous movie, yet the scenes move forward without reason - save for some tenuous thread that links to the mysterious secret society cum evil corporation that seems to be taking over everything.  Of course, Bond manages to seduce one beautiful girl despite his grief.

Dame Judi Dench performs credibly in the role of the boss lady Q, but even that is not enough to rescue this loudly violent piece of popcorn.

Sub-Prime Stagecoach

This article on the Wells Fargo bank, the sub-prime mortgage fiasco, and the ugly pervasiveness of racial discrimination read like an expose written decades ago.  Like in the 1950's, before the Civil Rights movement, before Kennedy, before a man walked on the moon. 

Yet the vehicle of prejudice was distinctly modern.  Wells Fargo loan officials are accused of systematically pushing mortgage loan applicants who were black into the sub-prime category, even if they qualified for less costly loans.  

Wells Fargo, Ms. Jacobson said in an interview, saw the black community as fertile ground for subprime mortgages, as working-class blacks were hungry to be a part of the nation’s home-owning mania. Loan officers, she said, pushed customers who could have qualified for prime loans into subprime mortgages. Another loan officer stated in an affidavit filed last week that employees had referred to blacks as “mud people” and to subprime lending as “ghetto loans.”

This, of course, made blacks much more vulnerable to mortgage default after the crash of home values.

The bank proffered bonuses in front of the loan officers for selling these sub-prime mortgages.   It is little wonder that they steered people into them - they even targeted the Baltimore area black churches for more customers of these poison pies.

Perhaps some of these loan officers were not outright racists.  Perhaps some of them thought they were just following a win-win policy, making their bonuses and giving people their mortgages.  

Perhaps the bank management didn't intend to setup a racist practice when they instituted the bonus policy.

Perhaps some of these people even voted for Obama.

And When Did You Last See Your Father?

The bad sound and lines of mumbled, marble-mouthed, English-accented dialogue are distracting.  Yet "And When Did You Last See Your Father" overcomes this handicap for the most part and presents an entertaining and occasionally poignant little film experience.  Despite its subject - the last days of a father dying of cancer and a son trying to reconcile his conflicting emotions - the movie succeeds by injecting a sense of life and humour through a series of flashbacks, and by keeping the maudlin to a minimum.

Jim Broadbent and Juliet Stevenson, as the dying father and suffering mother, provide excellent performances that span a few decades in elapsed time.  Colin Firth plays the adult son with a touch too much repressed emotion and old English anguish - especially in contrast to the larger than life personality of his supposedly philandering father.  There is also a sister - but her role verges on insignificant - one hopes that this editing didn't cause another family rift.  Hopefully, in the original memoir, the sister is actually part of the family.

The viewer never does discover a straightforward answer to one of the central questions of the movie - did the father have an ongoing affair with the boy's 'auntie - though there is a strong hint...

The answer to the 'secret' was not terribly important.  The family had its crises and its secrets, but managed to struggle through and keep itself intact.  Of course, this is a resolution the son can only attain in retrospect.

Chained to a Stump

Why in the word is the American news media still paying attention to Dick Cheney?

I understand that they like this idea of a trumped-up virtual debate between Cheney and Obama, that they think this supposed controversy will sell their product.

But how can there be a debate when one side has the credibility of a stump?  Do we need to go over all that again?

1.  Directed the fabrication of evidence of WMDs to justify a war that shredded any remaining legacy of American justice, virtuosity and ideal, while allowing the criminals and terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan to escape and regroup.

2. Directed the fabrication of legal opinion and legislation to justify the use of torture in interrogation, thereby shredding any remaining moral justification to obtain information that is by its nature suspect and useless.

All this reminds of the farewell media tour that Cheney took in his waning days of power.  The interviewer asked him, "Why is that, in the latest polls, you only have the support of 12% of the American public?"

Cheney answered in his best gruff, wounded bear voice.  "I don't care about the polls.  I care about doing what's right." 

The interviewer then let him off the hook by re-asking the same question in different forms, and getting the same smug answer.  Luckily for the interviewer, Cheney did not have his shotgun with him that day.

I would have asked: "How is it - if you are so convinced that you're right and continue to be right - that 88% of the people have come to believe you are wrong.   Do you think the American public is that dumb?"  

Amal

Amal is one of those movies designed for the naive and hopeful optimists of this world.  This is quite obvious from the title - Amal is arabic for hope - and it doesn't attempt to hide its black-and-white view of the world.  Set amidst the slums of a major Indian city (the setting provides the primary charm of the movie), Amal is an auto-rickshaw driver with an unlimited generosity of spirit - who cares nothing about money unless it is well earned, and is driven to live up to the sacrifices of his now-dead father.  His rather unbelievable goodness is contrasted against pretty much everyone else in society - who are uniformly motivated by greed, sloth and other deadly sins.  Amal meets a dying, grumpy millionaire who likes to slum around and annoy people - thus confirming their unworthiness - and (surprise) earns an unwitting entry into the old man's will.  The movie then meanders through empathy and coincidence as the viewer watches to see if the uber-deserving Amal will be cheated out of this unlikely inheritance.  

The Origin of Species by Nino Ricci

It is no wonder that The Origin of Species, a novel by Nino Ricci, won the 2008 Governor General's award for best English-language fiction.  It features a quintessential Canadian protagonist, Alex Fratarcageli, who is so emotionally repressed and lacking in self-esteem, so passive and frozen in obsessed inactivity, that the reader occasionally wants to pick a stick and whack the pages in an attempt to get him moving - somewhere, anywhere.

Based on the title, I had expected a novel that was technical, touching on Darwin and the theory of evolution.  Instead, I found a work of fiction that delved as deeply into its main character's mind and daily life as Dostoevsky's Crime and Punishment focussed onto the thoughts of Raskolnikov.   Indeed, the reader knows much more about Alex than his family, his friends, or even his Freudian therapist.

Strangely enough, though Alex never seems capable of proaction, of taking any sort of control of his life, he does fall into various exotic adventures, including a trip to the Galapagos where he becomes the thrall of a demented biologist Desmond, a virtual captive on a decrepit fishing boat embarked on a surreal tour of the origins of life.  

This incident somehow frames Alex's pursuit of a doctoral thesis, complemented by his pratfalls with the various women in his life, culminating in the accidental creation of  a child. 

And yet the reader understood, much before Alex does, if he ever does, that his essential character is kind and generous.  He feels guilty over Desmond's death, despite the despicable treatment at his hands.  He is genuinely concerned for the safety of Maria, a El Salvadorean refugee, long after his lust for her body has been rejected and dissipated over time.  He becomes the admiring and helpful companion of a young woman, who has has such verve and love of life despite a sentence of Multiple Sclerosis, and watches her body waste away towards death.

Fatherhood eventually, after much dithering and introspection, provides the impetus for a seeming growth spurt of maturity.  However, it is not quite believable given all the meandering that came before.  

It was also weird to read the copious descriptions of the famous and not-so-famous landmarks and denizens of Montreal,  ascribing an paranormal flavour to the familiar scenes.

This is an emotion that pervades the novel.  The sense of familiar viewed from an objective distance, where it is easy to judge, and difficult (though not impossible) to garner empathy for its self-described pathetic hero.

L. Ian MacDonald's - shilling for his homies.

The CBC radio Homerun segment with L. Ian MacDonald sunk to an unprecedented low on Tuesday, May 19, with the columnist spreading a thick and greasy defense of his 'friend', Conrad Black.

Perhaps Mr. Black's behaviour will end up being judged non-criminal - I'll leave that up to the U.S. Supreme Court to decide on the legal matters.  

There is no doubt, however, that Mr. Black is a shining example of corporate executives unable to act in an ethical or moral fashion.  He treated a public corporation as his personal ATM - with no withdrawal limits.   He carted out boxes of files from his office after being explicitly ordered not to tamper with evidence.   He certainly would have denied this act, except for the video evidence of his malfeasance.   

L. Ian promoted the sob story that Mr. Black sold his Manhattan apartment in order to pay for his legal defence, only to have the money garnished by the government.  Unfortunately, the truth, as reported by Peter C. Newman the previous afternoon, Mr. Black's legal fees have been paid by the Chicago Sun-Times, a newspaper that the former Lord has left bereft, on the verge of bankruptcy.  

L. Ian MacDonald offers the opinion, despite his disclaimer that Mr. Black is a former employer and a friend. that poor Conrad is a victim of a grave miscarriage of justice.   The listener could do without such self-serving opinions.

The Homerun host that day offered the complement that L. Ian is the ultimate political insider.  Perhaps a better term would the ultimate political brown-noser.  

Stripmalling by Jon Paul Fiorentino

Imagine an artist wearing a black smock (stitched together from holy, old Ramones t-shirts) spattered with a palette of wild and crazy colours, having painted a canvas, the easel, the walls of the studio, the floor, ceiling, and the furniture, with a variety of genres ranging from classic, romantic, realism, impressionism, cubism, minimalism, modern, post-modern, and post-post-modern.

That is Stripmalling by Jon Paul Fiorentino, a collection of essays, narratives, footnotes, asides, and graphic art that is pulled together into a cohesive whole with a sweepingly classic post-post-modern panache.  Or is that a collective hole?  

Unlike a certain Montreal Gazette reviewer who obviously lost his sense of humour in a horrific childhood accident involving a unintentional tonsillectomy, this reader did notice the comedy lurking in the sentences.  Granted, the juvenile humour is spectacularly juvenile, and the shock-the-innocent-reader-out-0f-his-pants attempts at humour fail with resounding impact.  And the graphics are strangely disturbing - the narrator Jonny is drawn as a buff yet greasy 1950's era caricature.  And even more disappointing, there is nary a hint of any porn, not even drawn with the broadest of strokes.

Ironically, it is the last section of the novel, a workshopped 'screenplay' with inanely scribbled comments that pricked this reviewer's funny bone in the most effective manner.  Leave 'em wanting more, Jonny...  Is it genius or just in(bred)genius?  Perhaps we'll never know.

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga

The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga is another angry-young man novel, similar in concept (if not in realisation) to Cockroach by 

Rawi Hage. However, there are two principal differences that set this novel apart from the uniformly hostile offering by Hage.

The narrator of White Tiger, Balram Halwai, tells his story with a voice that ranges from murderous rage to sunny optimism,

infused with a delightfully black sense of humour that lifts the tale out of its moribund details. In complement, the setting of the

novel, modern India with all its warts and exotic mysteries and social complexities, is portrayed in vivid and philosophical detail,

brought to life as a character in itself, becoming the antagonist to the narrator, a well-spring of contempt and devotion and

ultimate success. While the narrator's voice did not seem completely consistent throughout the novel, and his 'growth' as a man

is convenient and morally suspect, the triumph of the novel is its exploration of the India as experienced by the servant caste, 

its overriding thesis that the common man is kept in place by social convention, corruption and familial devotion, accompanied 

by a justified fear of reprisal.

Hancock

Hancock is a movie starring a mostly unshaven Will Smith about an amnesiac super-hero with alcohol and anger-management issues who discovers his kryptonite is a gorgeous blonde who is now married to his new PR agent but is really his immortal super-hero mate except for the fact they lose their powers around each other and tend to get almost killed over and over again, is filled with sophomoric attempts at humour, some of it based on sad jokes revolving around the sexual functioning of a superhero that have been floating around forever, has a plot that's non-sensical, incomprehensible and full of holes, populated with caricatures, and basically verges on accidental parody.

Don't you want to see it too?

Over-stimulation?

One of the mantras of the 'politically conservative' movement is that the government should not intervene in the economy.  

It just doesn't work, they say, the government can't really impact the marketplace in a significant fashion.

Of course, they also say "Let the market run itself, let it be efficient and the whole of society will get richer."  Or at least, "we" will.

The result of the latter ideology is now plain to see.  The deregulation of the financial markets has let to a housing bubble, multiple bankruptcies, a mortgage crisis, a credit crunch, a massive recession and the loss of trillions of dollars in the worth of pensions funds and other savings all over the world.

If the need for regulation and government oversight is not obvious now, it will never be.  The housing bubble led to massive profits, with the accompanying massive salaries and bonuses for the people who 'made' those profits.  They invented new ways to sell debt, and at the same time, new ways to disguise bad debt. 

I don't believe for a second that they didn't see the crash coming.  They took the money and held their noses, averted their eyes, buried their ethical and moral compasses.  

No one else was looking.  That has to change.

I also have to comment on the wailing in the financial community over the fact that they can't reap the same bonuses as before, especially from government bailout money.  They won't be able to retain their 'talent'.  Well, since that's the same talent that sunk the ship in the first place, I say good riddance.  Let the talent find something else to do, perhaps even try to produce something of real value.  

Now back to the first statement.  Government intervention doesn't work.  Yes, just like government regulation isn't necessary.    Right.

Of course, the bailout money for the banks was unseemly, especially in light of those salaries and bonuses.  But the market economy is based on confidence, and lettting the banks fail would have crushed that confidence completely, I suppose.  

The bailouts of GM and Chrysler were harder to swallow.  Capitalism after all is supposed to punish failure, not reward it.

However, it is difficult to blame the Obama administration for the intervention at the time.  Confidence was extremely fragile at the time.  It seems now the early bailouts for the car companies were simple a way to bide time, to prepare the American public for the news that these two institutions would have to go bankrupt, sooner or later.

As for the Obama economic stimulation package, there was little choice as well.

One can criticize the details, wasteful spending, silly projects, etc.  but Obama was constrained by two major points.

1.  The package needed to be big.  A smaller monetary amount would have been like trying to dig a tunnel with a spoon.

2.  He needed to act fast.  It is not possible to micro-manage each item in the package, nor to achieve the consensus of congress and the senate on each item.

Certainly, there will be abuses of all that money.  And future generations will pay.

But that is the fault of those who created the crisis.  The deregulators.  The tax-cutters.  The war-starters.  The morally bankrupt. 

History will judge the effectiveness of Obama's efforts to pull America out of this abyss.  But one certainly cannot question his resolve.

Social Democracy vs. Social Liberty

There was an interesting article in the NY Times Sunday Magazine  relating the author's (Russell Shorto) experience living in the Netherlands.  Its focus wasn't on liberal drug policy, but rather how Going Dutch (or being immersed in a socialist democracy) impacted his inculcated American belief system.

His first reaction was incredulity at the tax rate.  51 percent of his salary taken by the government was unfair, wasteful, almost communist.  He gets by this emotional signpost by realizing that, when the full tax rate in the USA is calculated, federal + state + municipal, a similar number will arrive.

The difference is not in the numbers, really.  Both countries also have modern economies, firmly based (for good or bad) on Capitalism and Global Trade (though one country is much larger of course).

The main difference is in the political mindset of the two countries and their peoples.  Social Democracy vs. Social Liberty.

It is interesting how this evolved in the Netherlands.  This is a land reclaimed from the sea.  Everyone needs to pump out water to stay above the water line, to stay alive.  This is a quintessential collectivist venture.  All have to cooperate to make it work (efficiently or not, it is essential).  This spirit of collectivism has permeated the political ideology of the Dutch.  If something is worth doing, the state should be responsible.  That only makes sense to the Dutch.

In contrast, the American political ideology was borne out of a wild, frontier state.  This has fed its obsession with gun culture, as well as nurturing a constant tension between the freedom of the individual vs. the control of the government.  It has spawned philosophical movements like Ayn Rand's Objectivism and political movements such as Libertarianism.  These right-of-right ideologies hold that the proper role of government should be to provide Defense and Security.  

There is no doubt that this emphasis of individual freedom (built right into the U.S. Constitution) has helped promote a culture of entrepreneurship, innovation and productivity.  The myth of the American dream, that anyone can succeed with hard work and perseverance, has been repeated so often, it's hard to resist.  

When there is no social safety net, one has no choice but to work hard.  The fallacy of this mythology is stark and obvious, yet ignored all the same.

The reality that American society is divided between the have and the have-nots.  The rich are getting richer, the poor poorer, the divide is ever-widening - a direct consequence of an ideology applied despite its dire consequences.  

Let's list of few of these perturbed policies:

1.  Unregulate the economy, let the market rule efficiently.  

Let's review the results.  The economy heaves in waves, one bubble after another, the well-positioned take the profits, the obscene salaries, the more-obscene bonuses, then scurry away as the bubble (internet, housing, etc.) collapses.  See Enron, WorldCom, Lehman Brothers, AIG, GM, Chrysler, etc.  Notice how efficient and profitable corporations are when there are few rules.  Notice how their quick and effective decisions turn things around.  Notice how quickly they go begging for public money when those decisions go bad.

2.  Cut taxes for the rich - the famous Reaganomic trickle-down effect.

Of course, this helps creates the aforementioned bubbles, along with humongous government deficits.  Money trickles down for a while, until the crash, when it has to be regurgitated back up.  Meanwhile, the middle class and below are encouraged to rack up more debt, buy more stuff, to keep the economy humming along.

3.  Never, ever, touch that military spending.

The U.S. is the world's superpower, the benevolent policeman who brings democracy and security to the world.  At least, when its oil supply is not threatened.  Military spending is the major factor behind its incredible government deficits, which of course limit its ability to provide other services, like universal health care, to its citizens.  But the U.S. must retain its mighty military.  Certainly, one understands that the politicians want this - who wouldn't want to wield that kind of power.  But it is curious that a nation built on individual freedom is at the same time so fervently nationalistic - another kind of collectivist venture - though perhaps lacking some elements of social empathy.

In contrast, the social democracy of the Netherlands is focused on providing services to its citizens, from socialized medical services to free education to subsidized child care to mandatory vacation and vacation pay supplements for all.  

This seems absurd to the American psyche - why should I pay for someone else's vacation! 

The theory is that these government policies will allow all its citizens to be happier, well-adjusted and ultimately more productive.

Perhaps this theory is absurd, but it is more humane than the supposed American approach - work hard and stay healthy or you'll lose your job, your medical coverage and your house.

The author of the Going Dutch article concludes that the collectivist system in the Netherlands works well because of the homogenous nature of its population.  To be sure, this country has its issues with integrating immigrants.  And perhaps, as the author mentions, there are a couple of examples of creative iconoclasts that have struggled against the uniformity of this society and eventually left the country to succeed.   However, the Dutch have a thriving artistic community - somehow these artists have found a way to challenge conformity from within.

Somehow, I think the author missed the real difference between the American and Dutch socio-political systems.  The difference is empathy. 

The Dutch collectivist bent is all about providing a social network, where most people can thrive.  The economy remains market-based, capitalist in its core, but tampered by the ethics (re. regulatory bodies) of its society.  Ideology and efficiency take a back seat to fairness and equity.  It doesn’t spend an unwieldy portion of its GDP on its military.

Of course, the Netherlands will never be a superpower.  But perhaps the world’s remaining superpower could learn a little from this little state.  

Life with a Two Year Old- Learning to count

It all started with the big, upcoming birthday.

"How old is Sera?"

"Two"

Yaay.

"How old is Mommy?"

"Two"

Double yaay.

Numbers larger than two prove more difficult.

"How many spoons do you have, Sera?"

"One, Two,  Three"

"Excellent.  One for Mommy, one for Daddy, one for Sera!"

But the number of spoons multiplied.

"One, two, three, four, five, six."

"Okay."

Any amount more than two was four, five, six.  Counting became a chant, a sing-song cadence chanted all over the house.

"One, two, three, four, five, six, nine, ten"  sings Sera.

"What happened to seven and eight?" asks Daddy.

"They coming soon!"

"Black Man" by Richard Morgan

This epic sci-fi novel by Richard Morgan is a super-spy thriller that also tackles issues like genetic engineering, institutionalized discrimination and religious extremism.  Its complex meandering plot (filled with sex and violence) focuses on the journey of the titled "Black Man", a genetically engineered bounty hunter (a "13"-style alpha male) who is hired to hunt (and kill) his "own kind", genetically engineered soldiers who've gone renegade.  If this sounds similar to the premise of "Blade Runner", it is.  

Some of Morgan's imagined future is absurdity stretched to the point of unintentional humour.   The United States, for example, has been split up, with the corporate run "Rim States" having seceded from the bible-dominated "Republic".  And the U.N. is a powerful player, if you can believe it.  Other genetic variants include the "Bonobo" woman, the perfect sexually-compliant woman, apparently based on the traits of a Bonobo monkey.  The author was clearly writing for the feminist market.

Best of all, the villain of the story is a "13" who stows away on a spacecraft coming back to Earth from Mars, and munches on the other passengers for sustenance.

All in all, an absorbing, entertaining and somewhat disturbing read on the beach.

Cockroach by Rawi Hage

Rage.  Anger.  An all-consuming hatred for pretty much everything.  That's Rawi Hage's novel in a nutshell.

The obvious comparison is to Dostoevsky's Notes from the Underground, at least in the narrator's self-regard, if not the florid writing style.  

It's the immigrant story viewed through the sewers, the underground of society, where only cockroaches can dwell and survive.  It's not a story that will convince the average Joe (the Canadian Plumber) of the value of immigration.  The narrator is easy to despise - a sick, lying, jobless thief, addict, and seducer - not all easy to empathise with, despite his obvious problems. 

It's a novel for the young - in that only a young person, full of strident opinion and in search of something to hate, could fall in love with the misery that consumes the narrator. 

The contrast between Hage's narrator and Yann Martel's narrator in "Life of Pi" is striking.  Martel's Pi Patel is an optimist, clinging to hope despite great calamity, cleverly camouflaging his unreliability until the end.  Hage's creation is the resolute pessimist, clinging to despair, upfront in his lies.  

And then the cockroach gets a job as a busboy (hard to believe he keeps it), a girlfriend (harder to believe - does he even ever wash), and finally an all-too-convenient chance to avenge another's pain, to assuage his own guilty past.   A funnily contrived ending to a story of rage and hopelessness.  

In the end, the reader is unable to find anything redemptive about this tale of the underground.  The narrator is barely recognizable as human, as a socialized being - how can we possibly care?

"Get Smart" - The Movie

I expected the comedic parody of the original TV series, a spoof of the cold-war spy.  Unfortunately, the producers of this movie probably thought they couldn't top the Austin Powers set of film classics.  Very unfortunate.  So we got an actual over-the-top, filled with special effects, explosions and car chases, wannabe blockbuster interspersed with some cheesy physical comedy (see the original Pink Panther movies for a much better example) and a few classic lines for the TV series thrown in randomly. 

It could have been so much better.  Why is so difficult for Hollywood to make a funny, intelligent comedy?

The Perfect Storm Again?

The former CEO of the Quebec Pension Plan Fund manager, Caisse de Depot, Henri-Paul Rousseau claims he couldn't possibly have known that the stock market was going to plunge.  It was impossible to foresee the collapse of all those financial institutions.  It was a perfect storm.  This time, it didn't claim a few Newfoundland fisherman.  It managed to sink the entire planet.

Right.  No one could see it coming, especially the experts.  They were too busy stuffing money in their pockets.  

Here's my take on the situation.

Some too-bright Wall St. guys looking for ways to make more money happened upon an idea.  Why don't we take a bunch of mortgages, package them all together, then split them up into little pieces, shares if you like, and sell them to investors.  Mortgages are really secure, we can sell them triple-A bonded.  So they went to the banks, who were happy to lend them millions to buy up these mortgages and re-sell them.  

So -

The mortgage brokers made money selling the mortgages to the Wall St. guys.

The Wall St. guys made more money selling the Triple-A bonded paper to the investors

The investor made money on these Triple-A bonded pieces of paper

And the banks made money on all of this

Until - 

The mortgage brokers ran out of legitimate home buyers

This was not good.  Nobody would make more money.

So they found a few non-legitimate home buyers.  And got people to take out new mortgages on existing homes.  And so on.  It was easy money.  The value of houses will always go up.  Guaranteed. 

The brokers were happy again.  The Wall St. guys too.  The investors.  The bankers.  No one noticed that the Triple-A bonded paper wasn't all that Triple-A anymore.  No one wanted to look under the covers.  No one wanted to stop the flow of money.  No one wanted to put an end to the party.

Then the bubble burst.  There were so many mortgage defaults, so many foreclosures that the price of homes started to fall.  Which caused more defaults, more foreclosures.  Suddenly, Triple-A became toxic.

And those that hadn't surfed out (Hey, Henri-Paul) of the way of the perfect storm got clobbered.

Of course, the banks can't be allowed to go under.  No one knows what would happen then. 

So the people who made billions keep their positions no matter what.  Great system.  Keep up the good work.

If you believe me, watch this video by Jonathan Jarvis.  And it has some cool graphics.

Life with a Two Year Old- Learning our colours

"What colour are Daddy's eyes, Sera?" 

"Uh... red!" she answered brightly.

"Gee thanks," I said.  "What colour are Sera's eyes?"

She shut her eyelids tight in evident concentration, clearly expecting to catch a glimpse of her eyeballs via some reflective process.  The logic was impressive.

"Sera, I don't think that will work.  You need to go look in the mirror."

"Mirror?" 

"Right.  Where's the mirror?"

She pointed over her shoulder towards the bathroom.  "Over dere," she said, then raised her arms skyward.  "Up now."

Of course, we need to look in the mirror right now.   As I lifted her, I re-tried the original query.

"What colour are Daddy's eyes?"

She looked at me intently, obviously aware that her previous answer wasn't correct.

"Pink!"  She said.

Much better.

Replicant Fading

'24' is a shell of its former self.  

The first few seasons were engaging and suspenseful even if you knew that Jack would always prevail.  Best of all, it wasn't dumbed down for the average viewer, and the technology babble wasn't totally ridiculous.   The violence and never-ending need for torture seemed to fit in a George W. Bush led, post-911 world.  It was a morality play turned inside out.  It was in-your-face fiction in search of non-stop thrills, though the real White House was rumoured to use it as a paint-by-the-numbers playbook for fighting terrorism.

Okay, so the series sometimes reached too far.  Jack's daughter joining the Counter Terrorism Unit (CTU) as an agent was a real stretch.  And of course the terrorists always have an almost unlimited supply of resources and backup plans, not to mention the ability to recruit at least one key employee of CTU.

But the true decline started last season (two years ago as a result of the writers' strike and Keifer's stint in jail).   My theory is that the writers were already on strike.  Perhaps the original writers left.  Or ran out of ideas.  Or forgot that dialogue should at least resemble what the actual characters might logically say, rather than using it to explain the convoluted plot.  

This season, '24' has officially jumped the shark.  The attempt to be politically correct in this year of Obama, while retaining some of the trademark Bauer edginess, is laughable.  The characters have become caricatures of their former selves, Chloe doing little else than making faces, and Tony returned from the dead with a perpetual scowl that couldn't be cured with a massive dose of Zoloft. 

Meanwhile, the producers attempt to wring every last penny out of the series.  Every time a cellphone rings now (which is quite often), the viewer is treated to a closeup of the Sprint logo.  Granted, we were used to seeing the Apple logo on the computers, but this new trend is blatant beyond any measure of taste.  

Heroes no more

The first season was fun, if too tailored for the ADD generation.  It has a comic book feel, and the characters were fun and even a little endearing at times.  The plot was silly but at least one knew who the villains were.

I caught the first season on DVD while the abbreviated second season was being broadcast.  From what I surmise, there wasn't a lot to miss.

Then came the attempt to watch the third season live.  Light entertainment has morphed into incomprehensibility.  And it becomes impossible to care about the characters when one can no longer tell who's good or evil, or even in what timeline they're currently over-acting in.

The writers only had one good season in them.  They should have quit while they were ahead.  Turn down that Hollywood money.  It corrupts, no doubt.

The S-Bomb

The U.S. Republican has discovered a new path to recovery:  label every action of President Obama as socialist.  Obviously, this is a much better putdown than just 'liberal'.  Watch for their rise in the polls closely.  Hold your breath if you want.

Books and booze: A splendid match

The Loquacious book club, located Tatamagouche, Nova Scotia, has built its own bar to host the monthly meetings.  This private, not-for-profit 'literary pub' boasts regular author visits and 7$ Grey Goose martinis.   The co-founder said she simply wanted a place to discuss over a glass of wine.

I'm sure they review only the best books, too, though the discussion might tend to wander after the second cocktail.

Age of Aquarius?

In a recently-viewed season 3 episode (no spoilers here) of Lost, Hurley manages to start an old VW van, which bursts to life with an 8 track stereo rendition of Shambala.

It's amazing how these icons from the late 60's and early 70's (the VW van and the pop-psychedelic music) conjure up a feeling of youthful rebellion, casting off the socio-sexual straightjackets of previous generations to search for truth and happiness in various non-conformant ways.  

The era now seems quaintly innocent to our jaded eyes.

The scene in Lost reminded me of the closing sequence of The 40 year old Virgin, in which the cast re-enact Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In from the musical Hair.

Funnily enough, the wikipedia entry claims the Age of Aquarius actually started yesterday, on Valentine's day, February 14, 2009.  Who knew?

The Buck stops where?

U.S. President Harry Truman famously kept a plaque on his desk, proclaiming "The Buck Stops Here."  Somehow, I think that message of ultimate responsibility has decayed over the following decades.

Perhaps the decline started with John F. Kennedy.  Though he is known for his resolute decisions, both good and bad (see the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Bay of Pigs) and great inspiration (the Civil Rights Movement and the Space Race), his presidency also ushered in the era of unprecedented celebrity and image over substance.  Maybe it was just the 60's vibe.  Or his supposed dalliance with Marilyn Monroe (and others).  Or the fact that he never got the chance to finish what he started.

Next came Lyndon Johnson.  He soldiered through the Civil Rights amendments of the JFK administration, but also mired the country on the Vietnam war.  Was he simply a victim of the irresistible military-industrial complex?

Richard Nixon ended the war by declaring victory as the American army fled, and brokered diplomatic contact with Mao Tse Tung and China.  Then he resigned amidst the disgrace of the Watergate scandal.

Gerald Ford seems to be best remembered for his pardon of Nixon (a distasteful act that apparently enabled the country to move on) and the ongoing Chevy Chase parodies of his clumsiness.  

Jimmy Carter began a trend of Washington outsiders, a humble peanut farmer who was eaten up by circumstance (the hostage crisis in Iran), inaction and vicious politics.

Ronald Reagan became the great communicator who vanquished the Soviet Bear, but also cultivated a slightly wonky image of a leader who needed to take a regular nap in order to stay awake during his briefings.  Maybe he missed the brief on the Iran-Contra affair.  Or the concept of a balanced budget. 

George H. Bush rode in on the coattails of Reagan, and seems best known for his unfortunate promise "Read my Lips - No New Taxes" and picking Dan Quayle as vice-president.

Bill Clinton took over with a bushel of promise, but helped sabotage his own plans with less-than-perfect execution.  He mired himself in sexual scandals, invited the scorn of the Moral Majority and opened the door for a majority Republican congress.  Yet he also reversed the deficit spending of the previous Republican administrations and ended up with a budgetary surplus.

George W. Bush took the reins of power and used a horrific event, the 9-11 destruction of the twin towers, to propagate an ideological agenda divorced from reality.  Some impressions from an exit interview of his vice-president Dick Cheney will suffice:

"Saddam Hussein had a pre-existing relationship with Al'Quada" - what they had a Facebook friendship?

"The evidence of WMD in Iraq was there - it's not our fault it was wrong"  - He forgets to mention that the evidence was trumped up on his request.

"One has no choice but to fight evil with evil" - These people have such a negative, mean-spirited view of the world, one that reinforces beliefs that policies like rendition and torture could actually work.

"We didn't see it (the collapse of the financial industry) coming - who did?"  Enough said.  The buck didn't stop there.

A smidgen of unsolicited advice...

As I sit here waiting for the American congress and senate to GET WITH THE PROGRAM, and stop adding useless amendments to the Obama economic stimulus package, I thought I'd perhaps offer a little advice to those politicians stuck in the mud up to their ears (which seems to have shut down whatever brain functionality they may have once enjoyed).

To the democrats:  I realize that the "Buy American" provisions play well to the masses.  But please, think a little before you act.  Do you really think that destroying the world of international trade will make the American economy flourish?

To the republicans:  Please, stop going on about more tax cuts.  It's embarrassing.  The entire world knows that the U.S. is hopelessly in debt.  And your solution is to further remove your ability to pay for your own programs, to continue the failed policies that helped create the economic bubbles which precipitated the mess we're in. 

A special note to Senator McCain:  I heard you say the stimulus package is actually a spending package.  D'uh.  No doubt you proposed a stimulus package without spending that day you rushed to Washington and tried to duck the debate.  Probably you've heard that you lost all credibility.  And p.s. you lost the election big time. 

One more for the republicans:  Please stop genuflecting to Rush Limbaugh.  He's an entertainer without material, a comedian missing a sense of humour, a racist who panders to the lowest denominator.  He's not the leader of the party, is he?

One more for the democrats:  Stop using the free-online tax return software and try hiring a real tax accountant, especially if you have aspirations for the presidential cabinet.

 And in general:  A post-ideological world beckons - all you have to do is open your mind. 

The 24 Effect

CBC News had a segment on the 24 effect, which posited that Hollywood helped pave the way for the American public's acceptance of the Obama presidency.  This segment, by the way, was shamelessly (and without mention) ripped off from an article in the NY Times Sunday edition.

The theory goes that film and television roles such as Dennis Haysbert's turn as a charismatic and effective African-American president on the Fox network show, 24, made it just a little bit possible to imagine a black president.  It is a persuasive argument, though made ironic by the rumours that 24 was also used as a primer for torture techniques by Dick Cheney and his band of evil cohorts.  One wonders what Fox News makes of the supposition that its own network helped elect a Democrat.

Both the CBC segment and the NY Times article travel back to the 60's, highlighting the ground-breaking roles of Sidney Poitier in "The Heat of the Night" and "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner".  Both also brought up the Bill Cosby vehicle, "The Huxtables", which portrayed a black man as an average (albeit upper-middle-class doctor with a gorgeous wife and precocious family) father-knows-best lives-in-the-suburbs American.  

The NY Times also had a picture of Richard Pryor which is less persuasive.  His brilliant, socially-skewering humour was somewhat overshadowed by the tragedies of his life.  It might have also mentioned Chris Rock's role as an American president, which was probably as influential as Bill Pullman's interpretation as the lantern-jawed, fighter-pilot leader-of-the-free-world.  Right.

Speaking of Independence Day, Will Smith merited a mention for creating a niche as the American hero icon who has African roots.   Yet, there was no mention of Denzel Washington who is the most accomplished actor of his generation.  Perhaps he should have portrayed Muhammad Ali instead of Malcolm X.  

And then there's James Earl Jones, who played the voice of Dick Cheney (sorry, Darth Vader) in one of the most popular film series of all time.  Perhaps that's not an illuminating example, either. 

Naked protests?

Headline news:  Montreal city hall floats a trial balloon concerning a proposed bylaw to ban wearing of masks during protests.  But they'll need to write the law carefully, to avoid it running up against the Charter of Rights.

So it may remain legal to attend a protest wearing a mask.  But don't do it naked.  You'll get arrested for sure. 

"Yes, We Can!" - but why?

"Yes, we can" - the spot on CBC radio uses Obama's voice and signature slogan to announce a contest to pick 49 Songs from North of the 49th Parallel.

What I can't figure out is why?  Ostensibly, it's supposed to help define Canada for the new president - but somehow I don't think it'll make it to his iPod, even to fill an empty moment or two during one of his 2-hour workouts. 

As a Canadian, I'm officially embarrassed and apologize in advance for this desperate misuse of Canadian content rules.  And for any April Wine song that makes the list.  Or Patio Lanterns.  Or, god forbid, Takin' Care of Business.

Elephants

A herd of elephants butcher a wide swath of the jungle when feeding; they're trample, they eat abundantly, they move on.

It bothered me when I read this.  I'd never thought of elephants as rude animals.  They seemed quite calm, almost graceful, despite their bulk.  They have prodigious memories.  They mourn their dead.  Yet they're not as innocuous as I imagined.

Why would nature allow such destructive creatures to evolve?  Nature of course doesn't care.  As long as the environment is bountiful enough to support their existence, the elephant herd survives.  

But their numbers are limited by their marauding appetites and the size of their jungle.  The elephant will be rendered extinct sooner or later.  Its habitat is being gradually eradicated by an equally rapacious marauder.  

However, the population of this usurper, the human being, shows no sign of abate - for the moment.