Ahab

There is perhaps nothing so funny in the world of crazy religions as a cult of neo-Calvinism in Seattle, of all places. Mark Driscoll's affected schoolboy masculinity and over-compensatory disdain for "feminization" and "limp wrists" and so forth and so on suggest a man who will never get over the shame of having sucked a cock or two in high school. Anyway, the laff line:

Driscoll’s New Calvinism underscores a curious fact: the doctrine of total human depravity has always had a funny way of emboldening, rather than humbling, its adherents.

Would you call this a "curious fact"? You mean that absolution from responsibility and moral culpability via belief in predestination will encourage men to behave with hubris? Shocking. Just shocking.

Cherem

I mean, J Street is as milquetoast as it gets, a self-described "pro-Israel, pro-peace" organization, which is Liberalese for wringing its hangs in exquisite regret while Israel bombs the fuck out of Gaza. Needless to say, this attitude is wholly inconsistent with the bloodlustful dweebs at Commentary. Jews so eager to get into the excommunication game should really just become Catholics. Spinoza was probably worth it. Eric Alterman and Michael Chabon, eh, not so much. I'm sorry that with the exception of the ultra-Orthodox, Judaism in America has become something like the old mainline Protestant denominations, which is to say urban, deracinated, and thoroughly Establishment, but seriously, we've all been in the country clubs for years now. Get over it already.

Jennifer Rubin is also pissed that Glenn Greenwald is pissed, perhaps naïvely, that the Congress is declaring, once again, its eternal and unending support for Israel to do fuck-all whatever it pleases. Why why why? The answer is that the anti-Arab/Muslim forces in America have successfully deployed a curious American contradiction, which is our national Cult of the Holocaust, which has become the central fetish for our moral pornography, even as Jews become ever-more-thoroughly mainstreamed. Have you never wondered why, precisely, there is a Holocaust memorial in Washington, D.C.? An apology to the passengers of the St. Louis etched in stone would be more appropriate. America did not go to war because of the Holocaust, did not fight the war because of the Holocaust, and just as it was really Stalin's Russia that won the war, it was Stalin's Red Army that liberated the most infamous camps of the East. It was not until decades after the war that school curricula, for instance, began emphasizing the Holocaust in teaching the history of WWII.

But its new centrality plays well into our self-image, fraught as it is with virtuous pomposity, and while most of the rest of the world sees that Jews are integrated into Western European society, constitute one of the most powerful demographic groups in the United States, and oh, by the way, possess their own nuclear-armed nation with the most sophisticated and powerful conventional military between the Straits of Gibraltar and the Indian Subcontinent, Americans see only another Holocaust about to spring up, somewhere, anywhere. At any moment.

Foodie Friday

One of my favorite menus for a dinner with a few friends.

Rolled, stuffed pork tenderloin

1 large pork tenderloin
several medium shallots, finely diced
several large cloves garlic, finely diced
a pinch of cumin, mustard seed, 1 clove, 2 all-spice berries, ground
freshly ground black pepper and coarse sea salt
a tablespoon or so of Dijon mustard
1/4 cup or so of Pecorino Romano, grated
fine bread crumbs
1 egg
fine sea salt
clarified butter
olive oil

Butterfly the tenderloin (here's an easy how-to. Mix the shallots, garlic, spices, coarse salt and pepper, mustard, and cheese. Spread on the meat, and then roll it up lengthwise (that is to say, beginning at one tip). I typically secure the roll with a thin bamboo skewer, or you can tie it with a length of kitchen twine. Beat the egg with a little bit of fine sea salt, then evenly brush the pork with egg, then coat it with an even layer of bread crumbs. Heat clarified butter in a good, heavy-bottomed pan,and then brown the pork on all sides, so that the crumbs for a light-brown crust. Transfer to a ceramic baking dish and coat very lightly in olive oil. Place in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for 1/2 hour or so (depending on the thickness of the roll). Remove. Cut into thick slices to serve.

Broccolini (Asparation) sautéed with lemon

Broccolini
olive oil
sea salt
1/2 lemon

Heat olive oil in a heavy skillet until very hot, just below smoking. Throw in broccolini, salt generously, and sautée, tossing steadily, for several minutes, until just tender. Squeeze 1/2 lemon over, and serve immediately.

Vichy carrots with bay

3-4 large "juice" carrots, sliced in 1/4" coins
several shallots, sliced thinly
sea salt
butter
filtered water
raw sugar
1 bay leaf
arrowroot

Melt butter in a heavy-bottomed pan. Add shallots and light salt, cook until they begin to soften. Add carrots and a bit more salt, sautée lightly. Add just enough water to cover, several generous pinches of raw sugar, and the bay leaf. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and cook until tender. Once tender, increase heat and slowly stir in arrowroot until the liquid begins to thicken. Let cool slightly so the starch set. Serve.

Bargain Basement

I'm not entirely sure why Citigroup gets to bargain with senators[.]

-Atrios

Dear Atrios,

Really? You're not?

Regards,
IOZ

Public Facilities

Look, Peter and Steve are great guys, and they really do give, you'll pardon me, buttloads of money to everyone and everything, but from where I sit, they could be the biggest pair of jerks this side of the Allegheny. The quality of their character has got nothing to do with the question of whether or not the most invincible city in America ought to have a bathhouse. And clearly, the answer is: yes, Pittsburgh should have a bath house. A guy died at the symphony several years back--heart attack, I believe--but we did not close Heinz Hall. What compelling government interest is there in preventing downtown's busy gentlemen from renting a $5 locker and getting fucked by a couple of strangers over his lunch break?

Somewhere in Time

One thing you may notice, if you’ve listened to the Coast to Coast AM radio program late at night while driving across the desert for no reason, is that it’s not spooky or entertaining at all in the daylight, sitting at your desk. It is just some delusional rednecks on a scratchy phone line, and Art Bell sounds as bored as a traffic-school instructor.

-Ken Layne at Wonkette

This is so totally true, but on the other hand, getting abducted by aliens is pretty boring in the daylight too, all like, Yo, guys, um, no need for the halogen hi-beams at 2 in the afternoon, you know? You ever see a Bigfoot during the day? They're kind of funny when they rub their asses against a tree, but that's about it.

Art Bell actually is something akin to a traffic-school instructor. Not just the boredom. He wants to get it over with, and he'd prefer to pass you, and he probably will unless you really, really, really fuck up. He blandly reminds the loonies to make a modicum of sense, and is pretty good at it. Most of the time they don't descend into incoherence, which is more than you can say for the guests of, oh, Michael Savage, even if the Weiner is a way-better host overall.

Anyway, George Noory hosts now, except for special episodes, so, like, whatever.

The Original Port Huron Statement, Not the Watered-Down Second Draft

Everyone's been having a go at this Big Hollywood thing, but I do urge you to read one Robert J. Arvech as he struggles to prove that The Battle of Algiers is . . . something.

But now, let’s examine the real Battle of Algiers, free from the powerfully romantic, but deeply dishonest imagery presented by Pontecorvo where Islamic terrorists are accorded heroic and mythic status. In truth, they were a bunch of sharia-spouting thugs, oppressors of women, and virulent Jew haters—your basic, blood-thirsty Islamofascists.

Now maybe I saw a remake or something, because the movie I saw showed the horrors of guerilla war through escalating acts of violent atrocity on both sides. Pontecorvo, despite being "drawn to the fanatical religious cult of Communism," (take one shot of triple-sic), rejected screenplays by the real Saadi Yacef and by Franco Solinas respectively for pro-FLN bias and for focusing on a single French character at the expense of Algerian colonial subjects. Mind: this is not obscure film-dork trivia, and even if it were--yo, brother, wikipedia.

I mean, Don Quixote may have been crazy to think the windmills were giants, but at least the windmills were there.

An Almost Immediate End to the Violence

Oh good lord. Legalize it!

Hippocrites

When pols promise to be "guided by evidence and effectiveness, not by ideology," you can be sure that they plan to follow a path free of the intellectual clutter of actual content. The bugaboo of "ideology" was born in the various Red scares, I suppose, and to Americus politicus suggests rigid doxological adherence to the Satanic catechism of Doc Marx and his merry band of Bolshevik apostles. Daschle means to suggest that he will use a sort of scientific process to discover and implement a better, more effective, more efficient means of providing health care to the country, but his method is more Aristotelian than scientific. He proposes to figure it all out ahead-a-time. Meanwhile, everyone agrees that under no circumstances would it be acceptable to create a system that works better than the current institutions, because it might put them out of business! An odd definition of competition, that. Oh well, everyone knows that in another ten years we're just going to eat nanobot pills and live forever until we mostly destroy ourselves in a vast orbital nuclear holocaust.

Who owns this hotel? Can the Jews have a room? And shouldn’t we blow up the bar and replace it with a mosque?

A Musical Play in Three Acts

by Thomas L. Friedman

Synopsis

ACT I

Scene 1
Early morning. A Bellhop is smoking outside of the service entrance. He sings ("Embrace the Future") of his misfortune. The Owner appears and castigates him angrily for wasting time ("Ultimate Confrontation State"). The Bellhop argues, and together they sing a duet ("Who Owns this Hotel?").

Scene 2
The grand lobby of the hotel bustles with workers and guests. The ensemble sings of the pains and triumphs of daily life ("Stop and Start at Will"). As the crowd disperses, the Bellhop finds himself face-to-face with a beautiful Girl, a guest. She asks him to take her bags, and he tells her that he has fallen in love with her ("True Protector"). She responds by telling him that she could love him too, but first he must make something of himself ("Bid for Primacy"). As the curtain falls, they embrace. Unseen by them, the Owner looks on in the background.

ACT II

Scene 1
In the employee lounge, the Owner confronts the bellhop about his affair with a guest ("Rejects and Recognition"). Together they sing a duet ("Disastrous and Reckless") in which the bellhop vows to pursue his dreams and the Owner laments the dreams he never fulfilled, which have left him angry and embittered.

Scene II
Alone on the beach and staring up at the brightly lit exterior of the hotel, the Bellhop sings an allegorical song ("Can the Jews Have a Room") about his position as an outsider. He prepares to return to the hotel, but is angrily confronted by the Girl's Parents ("Irreversible Threat"). He runs off into the night.

Act III

Scene I
In a hotel room, the Girl argues with her Parents. She tells them that she loves the Bellhop, and urges them to confront their own problems with alcoholism ("Blow up the Bar"). They react angrily, and the three sing a trio ("Civil War"). The girl leaves, slamming the door. The Parents come to see the error of their ways and embrace ("All of These Issues").

Scene II
The Bellhop has packed his belongings and is crossing the lobby, intending never to return. But the Owner has had a change of heart and rushes to stop him ("Great Struggles"), explaining that he has seen his own dreams crushed but wants the bellhop to have a better life. The girl arrives, pursued by her parents, and they all witness the Owner telling the bellhop that he is stepping aside and the Bellhop will now be in charge ("Earn Him Respect," "Who Owns this Hotel?: Reprise"). The bellhop and girl embrace, and the whole case sings a reprise ("Can the Jews Have a Room?" "Embrace the Future"). Curtain.

I Want My Em Tee Veeeeeeeeeeeeee

Being the Son of a Hospital CEO™, naturally I called Pops and asked him what he thought about Sanjay Gupta for Surgeon General and he explained to me that 1.) all doctors are morons; 2.) the chief of the medical staff is always the biggest, most self-involved moron in the passel of physician-savants; ergo 3.) the Surgeon General oughta be . . . But seriously, why not just make Lou Dobbs the Secretary of Treasury and Katie Couric our Ambassador to the UN? Gupta actually is a fer-real doctor, and yet his principal claim to fame is performing a nitpicking and largely inaccurate "fact check" on that movie where Michael Moore pits Fidel Castro against Charlton Heston in a mixed martial arts fight to the death. Is it really the job of the Surgeon General to tell us all whether or not açai is a superfood and give cookie-eating cubicle drones advice on losing weight without ever leaving their desks?

Pittsburgh Babylon

I want to state unequivocally that I currently have no recollection, to the best of my knowledge, of ever bumping into Yarone Zober at Club Pittsburgh.

Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius

So when you count the wars and other off-book spending you're talking about an annual deficit equivalent to 10 percent of GDP. What can you say about that? Our money is purely notional. It means nothing, represents nothing. It's one vast metafiction, totally self-referential, a system so floridly non-existent as to become magnificent.

Betamax

I'm a little late to the party, but there's something marvelous about Eliot "The Money's on the Dresser" Spitzer writing that we need to "make it cool to design the next cutting-edge video game or iPod" for one of these electronic internet news journal things. Brotherman, it is cool. I mean, I do love my Steelers, but mine is a generation that loves its graphic designers and facebook creators and The Googleand iPods. Lord only knows what the kids think is cool these days . . . nanobots and superviruses and FTL drives or something. The days of A/V club dorks getting smacked around by jocks aren't exactly over, but everyone plays video games, and you will find more young ones who want to be the next Bill Gates or Sergey Brin or Mark Zuckerberg.

E▪PLVRIBVS▪VNVM

Like the good little Augustus he is, Obama wants to stuff the guvmint with loyalists, lackeys, and dependable hacks. But La Feinstein is not pleased. "My position has consistently been that I believe the agency is best served by having an intelligence professional in charge at this time." (As opposed, one notes, to an intelligent professional. But we digress.)

I have no position on Panetta, but am pleased as can be that the Donk proves once again to be so splendidly inept at palace politics. Harry Reid barred Burris from the august chambers of the imperial city, meanwhile caving to Gopster demands that the Minnesota Frankenstein not be seated until . . . some other time. Boyking Black Reagan declares he will not pass his economic kidney stone without eighty senators on board. If not the mandate of heaven, at least a "bipartisan manner."

Lady Diane will cave, of course. Caesar will sit her down for a little chat, with Hillary behind him in houdou high priestess regalia holding the shrunken head of Vince Foster. As goes La Feinstein, so goes Harry Reid, who has all the tenacity of a plastic bag in a hurricane. They're just getting in their warbles while they still can.

It Ain't

This is usually more of the Wonkette beat, but whatevs. Go here to listen to human Sousaphone Brit Hume intone

Why is it that he's thought to be under a taint?

à propos Roland Burris.

What's This Day of Rest Bullshit?

JOHNNY CASPAR: It's a wrong situation. It's gettin' so a businessman can't expect no return from a fixed fight. Now if you can't trust a fix, what can you trust? For a good return you gotta go bettin' on chance, and then you're back with anarchy. Right back inna jungle. On account of the breakdown of ethics. That's why ethics is important. It's the grease makes us get along, what separates us from the animals, beasts a burden, beasts a prey. Ethics. Whereas Bernie Bernbaum is a horse of a different color ethics-wise. As in, he ain't got any. He's stealin' from me plain and simple.

-from Miller's Crossing

So, let's sum up the Blagojevich clusterfuck. Our modern-day Elliot Ness catches Hair-do musing on the value of a US Senate Seat, and as an exercise in preemptive justice, like Tom Cruise in that one movie, you remember, the one, he calls a big old presser and says that Abraham Lincoln and the Choirs of Heavenly Angels are singing salves and rending their garments because this bad, bad man did something that may or may not have been wrong. This, of course, is perfectly ethical behavior from a federal prosecutor. Nothing signals ethical rigor like gathering the national press and announcing a man's guilt before you even get a Grand Jury indictment. Now the Grand Jury is the most prosecution-friendly institution we've got, and a decent prosecutor can indict a kitten for cuteness if he so chooses, which leads me to conclude that Fitzy's case is about as tight as a boybutt after a DP scene. I.E., not so very. So, our, like, totally impartial justice system says, eh, here ya go, take another three months to see if you can make some shit stick to the wall. Laughable, man. Bush-league psych-out shit.

Gabor

Legal Eagle commenter la_rana noted this in comments a while back, but by Dog it's worth repeating, because even very, very smart men like Daniel Larison do not understand that there is no such thing as the "institution of marriage." There are, at least, two distinct institutions, one civil, the other spiritual. The latter does whatever it is that whichever particular religion claims it to do. The former confers a package of legal and financial rights and privileges onto two individuals who make a mutual contract. You can be married at city hall and never get the blessing of a priest, or be sanctified by your guru without ever going through the metal detectors downtown. Meanwhile, until very recently, historically speaking, so-called mixed marriages often went unrecognized by our various sects and denominations. A nice Catholic boy and a good Jewish girl joined by a rabbi weren't married in the eyes of Rome, etc. The idea that there's a unitary "institution of marriage" that is coextensive with all civic and religious attributes of the union we call marriage in conversational English is absurd and hysterical. This institution is invoked in opposition to same-sex marriage for one purpose: to have the state ratify a religious anathema, while mouthing--you'll pardon the expression--pieties and platitudes about equal protections in all but name. Those believers who wish to preserve their sacred institution from the encroachment of homos would do well to begin advocating for the end of civil marriage and the creation of some alternative means of conferring its attendant legal rights. Otherwise, and sooner than they think, they're going to lose.

Massacre of the Canaanites

One should be clear that this sociopathic indifference to (or even celebration over) the deaths of Palestinian civilians isn't representative of all supporters of the Israeli attack on Gaza. It's unfair to use the Goldfarb/Peretz pathology to impugn all supporters of the Israeli attack. It's certainly possible to support the Israeli offensive despite the deaths of these civilians, to truly lament the suffering of innocent Palestinians but still find the war, on balance, to be justifiable.

-The Greenwald

Dear Glenn,

No. It isn't.

Shalom,
IOZ