Island Passage

Jim Baen has launched a new, electronic magazine, Jim Baen's Universe! While subscriptions start at $30, they range up to $500 in a multi-tiered subscription scheme. "Wait," I hear you cry, "How can you sell identical digital bits for vastly different amounts of money?" Child, child. Don't sell the steak, sell the sizzle! Jim is selling Tuckerization rights to future writings by his stable of writers. For a mere $100 you get limited Tuckerization: Your Tuckerized character will be a minor character with a name but no dialogue, unless the author decides to expand their role, for his or her own dramatic reasons. In the $250 membership, things improve: Your Tuckerized character will be guaranteed to be a secondary character in the story, not a minor character. But way up in the $500 memberships things get very tony: Very extensive Tuckerization rights, if you wish to exercise them, by any author in the Tucker Circle , in either a book or a magazine st...

Yet more Bible illiteracy, this time from someone who must know better: the Reverend Jesse Jackson! "The ideologues over at Fox News have decided that to save Christmas, we've got to insist that stores advertise 'Christmas sales,' not holiday sales, and that cards wish people a 'merry Christmas,' not a happy holiday. Behind their moralizing, these folks are trying to use Christmas for petty political purposes. But that's not what the Christmas story is about either. It's about a couple--Mary and Joseph--forced by an oppressive government to leave their home to travel far to be counted in the census. They were homeless in a strange land."-- Jesse Jackson , Dec. 20, 2005 Jesse, you don't have a political purpose in your remarks?! Let me state my viewpoint. I don't watch Fox News. Heck, I don't pay for cable TV (I'm too cheap!) But just looking at your statement, I can see a couple of problems you may want to address. Okay, Jesse, stay...

Democrats continue to bang away at their "religion gong," assuring all us benighted Evangelicals that they do, too get this "faith thing." The latest exhibit is House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi's Jeremiad against the Republican budget resolution: "Mr. Speaker, as we leave for this Christmas recess, let us say, 'God bless you' to the American people by voting against this Republican budget and statement of injustice and immorality, and let us not let the special interest goose get fat at the expense of America's children. "The gentleman from Washington [state], Mr. McDermott, quoted the prophet Isaiah. And as the bible [sic] teaches us, to minister to the needs of God's creation is an act of worship, to ignore those needs is to dishonor the God who made us. Let us vote no on this budget as an act of worship and for America's children." Wow. So voting against the Republican budget is like going to church?! Oh, man! No wonder we...

Geoff Robinson over at Faith, Beer, and Other Things (which in itself is a great title) has my undying appreciation for a wonderful post headline: The Fool in His Own Heart Says "Multiverse" Which title spins off Biblical knowlege, cosmology, and Science Fiction in a great three-bank shot. Congratulations!

Okay, this will be my final post on the "flaming hypocrite" fish. The company that markets the magnets, Reefer Magnets, is featured in a Skagit Valley Herald story: A political parody of the ichthys, the Christian fish symbol, has put Washington state Democrats in some hot water and cast a spotlight upon a Mount Vernon activist who wants marijuana legalized. Allison Bigelow did not create the facetious fish, but her company, Reefer Magnets, owns the copyright and sells it on the Internet. “I didn’t make it,” she said. “Now I’m the one in the hot seat.” The parody is a car magnet with a cross and the word “hypocrite” inside the fish. The magnet comes on a piece of poster board with phrases meant to illustrate hypocrisy between Christian values and what some consider twisted morality of some of society’s Christian leaders, especially those with a hand in politics. So what are these phrases that provide clues to the "twisted morality" of some of society's Christia...

In response to the outcry over the fish magnet offered on the state Democratic Party web store, Democratic Party Chairman Paul Berendt had the item yanked . Tuesday Berendt said, "The moment I became aware of it, I insisted it be taken down. I'm sorry if anyone was offended. It's embarrassing." You insisted Paul? Was there opposition to the directive? Who's in charge over there? So where does the fish come from? According to the Seattle Times : The fish magnet is copyrighted by a Mount Vernon company called Reefer Magnets. The company mostly sells magnets with pro-marijuana messages such as "Hemp is Patriotic" and "Jesus is coming, roll another joint." Berendt said he wasn't sure what the fish symbol is supposed to mean but said he thinks it is aimed at "people who claim to be pro-life but are for the death penalty." Paul, it's time to file a malpractice suit against the doctor who installed that tin ear...

I'm not somebody that slaps bumper stickers onto my car. There are many worthy causes and viewpoints that I uphold and support, but are unrepresented on my bumper. In fact, this reluctance has annoyed Mrs. Islander for years. I have been a member of a Pentecostal church of one kind or another for over 20 years, yet my car does not sport the little chrome "fish" one often sees here and there. This is not to say I despise these badges of viewpoint. I find the more restrained ones kind of classy, quite unlike the "I Found It!" and "Honk if You Love Jesus!" bumper stickers. When I first saw the "Darwin" fish-with-legs I almost ran off the road laughing. Though it was derivitave, it was smart, cute, and had the advantage of gently turning the Christian "fish" into the setup to the "Darwin" punchline. The Christian "fish" eating the Darwin fish was less funny, but still tasteful. But there have been lots of less tastef...

Warning: this is a post of the Seinfeldian variety. That is, it's mostly about nothing. A few weeks ago, after haven taken the grand-Islanders Trick-or-Treating, I was lying, exhausted, in bed on the edge of sleep. As I snuggled down into the covers, hearing the cold wind moan outside my window, it occurred to me how much this sensation differed from falling asleep outdoors in daylight. I know, Deep thoughts, Maynard. But I warned you. Falling asleep outside is a light sleep. It is as though a part of my brain stays alert for unfamiliar sounds or the approach of unexpected presences. Even with this lack of depth, few things are as sweet as lying warmed by the sun, lulled by the humming of bees and the scent of green, growing things, and just drifting imperceptibly to sleep. Falling to sleep with the sound of ocean surf produces in me a sleep that is almost like being drugged. Once, Mrs. Islander and I got away for the weekend to a costal hotel, sleeping in a room that overlooked...

Taleena over at Sun Comprehending Glass takes me to task because in this post I speculate aloud about the chances of a couple of social moderates capturing the social conservative's vote: Wither "Social Conservatives?" What will 2006 and 2008 bring? I think that rank-and-file social conservatives will vote for a McCain or a Guliani, if they feel that they have a conservative Supreme Court to guard the legacy of their gains of the last 20 years. I found Taleena's response puzzling: I think he over estimate's McCain appeal and I stand by my earlier comment: "Social conservatives" will be split down big vs. small government lines in '06, but will ultimately back a tough Hawk in '08 as Western Europe slides deeper into dhimmitude. ...and so I commented: Do we have a bigger hawk on the national Republican scene that McCain? Do not the centrists voter swoon at his name? Has he not traction among the moderate Democrats as the anti-Bush? Taleena repli...

In response to Taleena's comment to an earlier post, let me deconstruct the "social conservative" vote. "Social Conservatives" = "Political Christians." There. Having in one fell swoop decrypted 50% of current political newspeak, let me expand my remarks: Catholics = Traditional blue-collar lunchbox Democrats. The Democrats ran working class Catholics off the reservation in 1973 with their embrace of Roe v. Wade to the exclusion of all else. Non-pro-abortion candidates were barred from speaking at national conventions and from having any voice in platform committees. Made the jump to Republican identity with Reagan's 1980 campaign. Still feel more comfortable with the Dems social emphasis. Would bolt in a New York minute for a pro-life Democratic candidate. African-American Christians (AME and others) = Since 1964 Democratic. Their shift from the Republican Party is the second greatest political blunder in modern US history. When the Party of...

Todd, over at Life on a Pacific Island , has a posting about C.S. Lewis's reservations about live-action versions of the Narnia chronicles. Todd says, essentially that if only Lewis could have seen Peter Jackson's Lord of the Rings, he would have rested easily. Here is the relevant passage: ...I am absolutely opposed – adamant isn’t in it! – to a TV version. Anthropomorphic animals, when taken out of narrative into actual visibility, always turn into buffoonery or nightmare. At least, with photography. Cartoons (if only Disney did not combine so much vulgarity with his genius!) wld. be another matter. A human, pantomime, Aslan wld. be to me blasphemy. I think what Lewis is objecting to is the grotesquery of portraying the godhead in pantomime. I feel rather certain that Lewis would never object to the convention of of the masque, or to the portayal of the godhead in passion plays. It is the pantomime that raises his ire. However, Lewis seems to feel that animation would be an ...

I love stories about the behind-the-scenes activities that make up a great political campaign. I have an odd sort of soft spot in my heart for the 1964 Republican party who, in nominating Barry Goldwater on the first ballot, showed the world that they would rather be right than be successful. That's why I enjoyed the following anecdote about a wonderfully hare-brained scheme cooked up by William F. Buckly: William A. Rusher Connoisseurs of conservative intrigue are largely unaware of a remarkable idea that occurred to Bill Buckley in or about the late spring of 1964. Barry Goldwater was well on his way to amassing the number of delegates that would (and eventually did) assure his nomination for president on the first ballot at the Republican convention in San Francisco in July. But thereafter he would have to face President Lyndon Johnson in the general election in November, and not even Barry’s warmest admirers were very optimistic about his chances of beating the formidable Texa...

From Instapundit.com : -------------------------------- WHY THE REPUBLICANS SHOULD BE WORRIED, and the Democrats should be seizing opportunities: Driving in to work this morning, I heard this guy talking on the Hallerin Hill show, and he noted that he votes for the Republicans because of their stance on money and taxes, but that he agrees with the Democrats on a lot of other issues. If the Democrats would just lose their hostility to the idea of people getting rich, he said, they'd have his votes and millions of others. I think that's probably right -- and I'd guess that Gene Sperling does too. That's why, as I suggested in my column yesterday, it's important that the pro-growth Democrats get a hearing. And while Republicans might prefer that they lose out, the truth is that sooner or later the Dems will be back in, and we'd rather see them sensible on economic matters when they are. Of course, there's still the whole national-security issue, whi...

I've often thought that being famous would be unpleasant, and so have never been much interested in magazines about celebrity. James Lileks briefly sums up much of my thinking: If I'm in the checkout line and I see two mags, one of which says, BIRD FLU WILL KILL US ALL, the other of which says CAMERON DIAZ'S ACNE HEARTBREAK, well, I'll go for the former. Because Diaz's skin condition is something I can get around to later after we've buried the dead. And if it's cleared up by the time the pandemic subsides? Happy ending for everyone. Of course my chances for fame peaked in the 1980's when I appeared on a local Portland, Oregon television game show. Won four nights running, choked on the fifth night.

Glenn Reynolds posts this email from a reader who should know: As a medical researcher, I want to make a gentle but sincere plea to the blogosphere to calm down this flu hysteria just a bit. The main way that flu kills is by predisposing its victims to "superinfection" by bacterial illnesses - in 1918, we had no antibiotics for these superimposed infections, but now we have plenty. Such superinfections, and the transmittal of flu itself, were aided tremendously by the crowded conditions and poor sanitation of the early 20th century - these are currently vastly improved as well. Flu hits the elderly the hardest, but the "elderly" today are healthier, stronger, and better nourished than ever before. Our medical infrastructure is vastly better off, ranging from simple things like oxygen and sterile i.v. fluids, not readily available in 1918, to complex technologies such as respirators and dialysis. Should we be concerned? Sure, better safe than sorry, and concerns a...

I saw Serenity opening weekend and I loved it. Mrs. Islander (who has been driven crazy by my incessant playing of the DVDs) also loved it. We both stayed through the credits and enjoyed the guitar rendition of the TV theme at the end. However. While I enjoyed the movie, I have come to the conclusion ( shared by David Edelstein over at Slate magazine) that the television show is better. Why? Joss Whedon does two things better than almost anyone writing screenplays today: he builds great ensembles through writing superior dialog that builds character relationships; and he tells stories about big subjects with a light and deft hand. The first of these talents blooms best in an extended, multi-episode format such as a television show. For example, the conflict between the Simon and Jayne is so well developed that, by the episode "Jaynetown," Simon's line "No, this is what it feels like to go mad!" carries a payoff far outweighing the setup of the previous 15 minut...

I am compiling a style guide for my shiny new publications department (as a Wiki!). Part of that style guide is a list of "Best Practices," which for me resolves to a "must-do," "don't-do" list. The faithful reader is encouraged to submit additions. == 10 Things You Must / Must Not Do == Always ask yourself, “How will this read to outsiders.” Never assume your document will be read only by people for whom it was intended. Always use the styles, templates, and font families specified by Publications and Marketing that provide a consistent “corporate voice.” Never invent a new style for a single document. Refer to the Style Guide. The Style Guide is your friend. It saves you from having to make a dozen nit-picky decisions every day. Never attempt humor in corporate documents. When humor misfires, it makes everyone look a chump. (“Dying is easy, comedy is hard.” -the last words of Sir Donald Wolfit, British actor and director) Prefer...

On December 9th, 2005 a movie is being released which I am anticipating more than I anticipated Serenity . (And the faithful reader will know that I was crazy waiting for Serenity .) That film is The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe . If you are unaware of what The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is about, meet Mr. Google . The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is being produced by Walden Media . Walden Media has been creating a slate of family-friendly movies, including: Because of Winn-Dixie , Charlotte's Web , Around the World in 80 Days , and many more. Of course, times being what they are, no good act goes unpunished. Don't you know that it's all a plot by those intolerant Republicans? (h/t Taleena ) The movie is being co-produced by Disney and Walden Media, which is owned by Philip Anschutz, a Colorado billionaire. Anschutz, his family, his foundation and his company have donated nearly $100,000 to Republican candidates and c...

...are in Seattle. That's what Perry Como sang for the TV series Here Comes The Brides . This is the kind of day that keeps people sustained through the grey, damp winter and spring. It's a cloudless day, mid-to-upper 60's, humitity is 57% with a light breeze from WSW. Pomona, now is mid-80's, but with humity at 22% it seems cooler (that's what I told the chicken in my oven). Austin is 80 with thunder and humidity at 80%. Yow! And so I'm out to suck up as much of this day as I can.

In an almost dreamlike way, I have received the news that I have press credentials for an advanced screening of Joss Whedon's Serenity . I am not quite the fanboy over " Firefly ," (the television show that is the basis for the movie Serenity ) but I have watched every episode as it aired, bought the DVD box set and have driven Mrs. Islander nuts with repeated viewings, loaned the DVD set to several people, and have been on tenterhooks since the movie's distribution was delayed from May to September. How is this not the behaviour of a fanboy? Well, I don't wear a yellow knit toque, nor do I wear a brown duster. Part of the agreement for receiving the press credentials was that I would write up a review of the movie in my blog. So far, my blog has an audience of 3. So for all three of you, tomorrow sometime, I'll provide an unbiased, spoiler-free review. Favorite Serenity quote: "Think of [Serenity] as Star Wars, if Han Solo were the main character, and h...

I have always been the kind of person who has within himself a kind of interior dialog, a sense of riding around in my head about an inch behind my eyeballs. I have always had a sense of myself as an observer of my own life. Though Socrates said that the unexamined life was not worth living, this is kind of self-referential detachment is not without a price. There have been few moments experiencing that life when that sense of detachment wasn’t there. Seeing the sun setting behind the Olympics, sitting on the grass at the Hollywood Bowl listening to Barry Tuckwell perform a Mozart concerto, or even lying in the arms of a beautiful woman, The Observer was recording, commenting, assessing. The Observer didn’t always use words, but his knowing presence was there all the same: So, this is what the John Donne meant in that couplet! I wonder if I’ll ever see a green flash. How much better this sounds than the studio sessions! Last Saturday morning I completed my first test in Aikido, the t...

There is a good article today over at OpinionJournal.com about the sad state of Biblical Literacy: Do we need to know what it says in the Bible? Are we somehow illiterate if we don't? Up until, say, 100 years ago, biblical literacy would have been practically mandatory. If you didn't know what "the powers that be" originally referred to, or where "the writing on the wall" was first seen, or what was meant by "the patience of Job," "Jacob's ladder" or "the salt of the earth"--if you didn't know what an exodus was or a genesis, a fatted or a golden calf--you would have been excluded from the culture. It might be said that a civilization consists, at its core, of these easily transmitted packages of implication. They are one of the mechanisms by which cultures can be both efficient and rich. You don't have to return to first principles every time you wish to communicate. You can play your present tune on a received inst...

I have over the years enjoyed the radio work and writings of Garrison Keillor. I began listening to "A Prarie Home Companion" back in the 1980's. I bought cassette copies of my favorite shows. (My all-time favorites are "The Royal Family," and "Tomato Butt.") I bought Lake Wobegone Days , Leaving Home , and WBLT . I truly identified with his journey from small-town boy to a grown-up bemused by the changes in the world around him. So it really hurts to read what Mr. Keillor thinks of me. I seem to be some sort of monster in his eyes : The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, p...

Peggy Noonan has a thoughtful column today in the Wall Street Journal. In it she voices the concerns of conservatives over the Bush administration's spending policies. The point she makes is that we are straying from fiscal conservatism into an unknown future without any discusion about this major change of course: Here are some questions for conservative and Republicans. In answering them, they will be defining their future party. If we are going to spend like the romantics and operators of Lyndon Johnson's Great Society; If we are going to thereby change the very meaning and nature of conservatism; If we are going to increase spending and the debt every year; If we are going to become a movement that supports big government and a party whose unspoken motto is "Whatever it takes"; If all these things, shouldn't we perhaps at least discuss it? Shouldn't we be talking about it? Shouldn't our senators, congressmen and governors who w...

I ran across another item to add to my disater-preparedness to-do list: the home inventory. A home inventory can give you a good overview of what you have and where you have it. (Camcorder, upper shelf of hall closet.) This facilitates two actions: grabbing what is truly valuable when it's time to bug out, and recovering after it's over. I am not currently carrying renter's insurance, but I plan to become a homeowner in the next few months and this can substatiate and speed the claims process by a bunch. It may take a few extra hours, but just jotting down a list as we move stuff into our home could eliminate a lot of the, "Where's my super-suit?" dialog. Also: Taking digital pictures of each room, and shots of valuable items (TV, Computer, etc.) to illustrate the inventory would be helpful. The pictures could be burned onto a CD-ROM disk that is then kept with the valuable papers.

Major Quake Could Be Worse Than Katrina Asteroid Strike Almost Certainly Will Be. Geeze, I wish is that these stories would provide a little context . A category 4 or 5 hurricane strike (Katrina was a category 4) was inevitable, but the odds of it landing in any particular year were judged to be 0.5%. That’s why there wasn’t a Manhattan-Project-type flurry of levee and seawall construction during the last, oh 50 years. That's why people continued to live in a city below sea level. They were on a roll, playing the long odds. That's why people live in Los Angeles. If you roll the dice for long enough, you'll crap out. I have heard a lot in the last week or so about how residents of the Gulf coast would refer to the coming “Big One,” the storm that would descend like the wrath of God and scour the land. Lot of evacuees from New Orleans talked about the fatalism that was common in the city concerning its eventual destruction. All these remarks have an eerie simila...

Apparently the Avian Flu (see below) lacks the ability to be transmitted from human to human. All cases have so far been from bird to human (hence the name...). ...It [Asian flu] kills 100 percent of the domesticated chickens it infects, and among humans the disease is also lethal: as of May 1, about 109 people were known to have contracted it, and it killed 54 percent (although this statistic does not include any milder cases that may have gone unreported). Since it first appeared in southern China in 1997, the virus has mutated, becoming heartier and deadlier and killing a wider range of species. According to the March 2005 National Academy of Science's Institute of Medicine flu report, the "current ongoing epidemic of H5N1 avian influenza in Asia is unprecedented in its scale, in its spread, and in the economic losses it has caused." In short, doom may loom. But note the "may." If the relentlessly evolving virus becomes capable of human-to-human trans...

CBS's foray into the blogosphere, The Public Eye , has a neat little sidebar called The Rules of Engagement . It's so neat, I'd like to take it home and adopt it for my own: Public Eye is going to have some pretty strict rules of public etiquette. People who want to post comments on Public Eye and join in our debates and conversations are going to have to follow our rules. We know that not all Web logs are like that, but this one is. If it's any comfort, the Public Eye team promises to follow the same rules. And we'll try our best to be clear about what the rules are. When they change -- and they will -- we'll let you know. There’s legal language nearby. Here's the plain English: no libel, slander, no lying, no fabricating, no swearing at all, no words that teenagers use a lot that some people think aren't swearing but we do, no insulting groups or individuals, no ethnic slurs and/or epithets, no religious bigotry, no threats of any kind, no bathroom ...

Taleena comments: Disaster Planning in this state was recently evaluated by a Representative who is also a National Guard. I was greatly reassured by his assesment of preparedness on a state level. I have talked to the kid's pediatrician about avian flu and am less unhappy about US preparedness than I was. Whether the avian flu will jump to humans and IF our medications work on it is another ball of wax. Avian Flu has made the jump to humans in Southeast Asia . The question has become: how contagious and virulent are the strains that have made the jump, and how effective are our current public health treatments and measures. As to treatments, apparently current antivirals are effective, a vaccination would be much more effective. As to the public health issues, the reason that I recalled the Swine Flu scare is that it became a metaphor of government incompetence in the late 1970's and helped keep President Ford from re-election. Recall also the bioterrorism scare in 2002...

People over a certain age remember the Great Swine Flu scare of 1976. On Februray 5th of that year, an Army recruit at Fort Dix, New Jersey said he felt tired and week. The next day he was dead. The public health officials of the time saw good evidence that the disease that killed the recruit was closely related to the "Spanish" flu that killed up to 100 million people worldwide in 1918-1919. The disconnect between the public health concerns about a new pandemic and the media's response is alarming . If the scientific complications of the National Influenza Immunization Program (NIIP) were not enough, the media only helped to make the situation worse. First of all, while the program received broad support at its inception, the press was quick to criticize the program once no new incidents of swine flu appeared in the months after the Fort Dix affair, and emphasized the criticisms of people such as Albert Sabin, known for his polio vaccinations, who originally supported t...

…And speaking of the Katrina disaster… Though the media are focusing on New Orleans , Katrina made landfall in Mississippi and the damage extended well into Alabama . Apparently the state governments there reacted appropriately. I don’t want to trade in stereotypes here, but how bad is your state government when it is less effective than Mississippi and Alabama ? I'm an implacable opponent of my Governor Christine Gregoire but she doesn't seem as inept as Governor Blanco. In any case, the last few nights Mrs. Islander and I started talking about disaster preparedness. While the example of the Superdome is extreme, it does point out the problems of not preparing for and not responding correctly to an emergency. We seem to be ahead of many of the poor families paraded before the television cameras: we own a minivan and a small pickup truck, we are married with all of our children grown and living on their own, we have some small money in the bank for emergencies. Bu...

Scott Edelman has an editorial over at SciFi.com entitled: The Odds of Being Uneven . It's a thought about how the fruits of science and technology seem to be poorly distributed among the population. He quotes William Gibson's aphorism, "the future is already here—it's just unevenly distributed." I sent a reply to SciFi.com and to Mr. Edelman that I am adapting for this post. Certainly the problem of uneven distribution of the fruits of scientific and technological advance is one of great challenges of our age. However, the challenge needs to be seen in two segments: those who cannot take advantage of those fruits, and those who (for various reasons) choose not take advantage. In the first segment we have those have no access to the "Future," those for whom geographic or cultural isolation bars them from those fruits. These can include indigenous peoples living in the Amazonian rain forest or sub-Sahara Africa. Bringing the future to these peoples seem...