The Undefeated

Just got back from an exclusive (as in, playing in only ten cities across the U.S.) showing of The Undefeated, a documentary of the career of Sarah Palin. Y'all had to know that I liked her, but this - WOW! She is the real deal. For sure.

Technical gripe: I thought some of the emotionally-charged nature scenes (ravening wolves, jaws) were a bit gratuitous and hyperbolic. However, the political commentary was spot-on and the raw footage of real events and speeches was spectacularly inspiring. Sarah Palin's record of accomplishments is truly astounding. If she runs for president, I suspect it would take an act of God (or maybe George Soros) to stop her.

Very quickly, now

Blogger has been most annoying lately. (Or maybe it's been going on for a long time, and I just haven't posted much lately...) It seems all I have time for these days is the occasional picture post with quick captions, but I give that up all too easily whenever Blogger has conniptions. Hence few posts. It is a pity, because as Lord Goring observed, I am quite full up of information and feel like the latest edition of something-or-other, only there is no one in the house to talk to. Except, as it happens, that is hardly the case, as Jane and Ella provide ample conversation these days. Alas that baby books run out of room after about the first year.

Jane: Why does my car seat have arm rests?
Me: To rest your arms.
Jane: Or maybe to rest your elbow, when you're untangling a tangle.

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Ella: Please hold me! Jane is being Ursula!
Me: Ursula is just pretend, and Jane is not mean.
Ella (to Jane): Ursula, you are not mean.

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So we went to a tax day tea party at the state Capitol last Thursday. It was important to go, and the train ride downtown was an adventure for the girls. In truth, I've fallen under a deep cloud for the last month re: healthcare, and it's hard for me to see how any good can come of the breakdown of our economy and the dissolution of our country. Of course I always knew that America wouldn't be around for the end times, since it doesn't merit a mention in Revelation, but I never expected to be there to see it. Have I mentioned that I've been feeling rather bleak lately? Not at all related to turning thirty next week, which doesn't depress me in the least, because I'm mathematically savvy enough to realise that I entered my thirtieth year last birthday.

RE: Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act of 2008

Dear Senator,

The aforementioned piece of legislation has just come to my attention, and I am appalled at the potential ramifications that enforcing this bill may have, both for the flailing economy in general and for my family in particular. As I understand it, requiring all products (clothing and toys) designed for children 12 and under to be tested for lead and phthalates could have the unintended consequence of wiping out the second-hand industry as we know it.

I understand the desire to protect our children from shoddy goods imported from China, but this legislation was absolutely the wrong way to go about it. With times as tight as they are, it is unimaginable that the US Congress would allow this legislation to be actually enforced. I depend solely on second-hand sources to clothe my children, and with a third child expected this summer, I know I cannot afford to pay full-price for new children's items.

Seriously, children are far more threatened by second-hand cigarette smoke than by the potential side effects from hypothetical lead in the occasional beadwork on their clothing. Let me, as the consumer, make the choice to purchase items for my family, using my own discretion to weigh the risk of whether I feel threatened by the potential lead content of any particular toy or item of clothing.

If you want to require this testing for all children's products going forward, that would be a more fair way of handling the situation. At the very least, this legislation needs to be revised to apply only to new products being manufactured, and should never apply retroactively to all the goods out there already in circulation. We need much more clarification and revision to this law before it takes effect next month.

My main concern, of course, is with the availability of second-hand items for my family and the effect this law will have on the second-hand industry in general; I haven't even touched on the devastating consequences this would have for small business owners, artisans, craftsmen, and the like, who run their small cottage industries in the best of the entrepreneurial spirit, and who cannot afford to have expensive product testing for their handmade hairbows, aprons, and other goods they sell on Etsy, for example.

I am astounded that this legislation somehow passed without general consumer knowledge. I wish we had had time to lobby about it before it was voted upon, but as far as I can see, the information is just now hitting the blogosphere. Trust me, this thing will spread like wildfire. Small cottage industries, frugal families, second-hand stores, and environmentalists concerned about the impact of trashing all the perfectly good items whose only crime was to be manufactured before February 10th, 2009, will all rise in protest. There will be a huge backlash if this thing goes through. I respectfully request that you be our advocate on this issue and make every effort to repeal or substantially amend this devastating piece of legislation before it is enforced.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely,

Rose Focht

Dear Scranton Times-Tribune

To Whom It May Concern:

I understand that you recently published a story wherein reporter David Singleton alleged that someone in the crowd shouted "Kill him!" (referring to Obama) at a Palin rally, and that you continue to stand by the story, insisting that "the facts reported are true and that's really all there is," despite the fact that the Secret Service investigated the matter thoroughly and found no evidence that this event actually transpired. I really appreciate how you stand up for your employees, even when there's no corroborating evidence for their stories and all eyewitnesses interviewed deny the story's veracity.

(Actually, it kind of reminds me of the old saw: "If a tree falls in the forest, and no one is there to hear it, does it still make a sound?" If someone yells, "Kill him!" at a political rally, and no one hears it, did he still say it?)

Because this is the kind of job security I'd value, and because I'm starting to get a feel for the kind of sensational yet utterly unassailable stories you run, I would like to submit my own article for publication to your newspaper, recounting the events which I personally witnessed at a local McCain rally. I was there in person, and at one point I distinctly heard a fervent McCain supporter yell, "Tar and feather him! Draw and quarter him! Run him out of town on a rail!" when Biden's name was mentioned. Actually, I also heard another unmistakable McCain supporter yell, "Roast him! Boil him! Squash him into jelly!" *

No one else heard or saw any of this, aside from me, but I was there and I swear it happened. I know you take your reporters' observational skills seriously, so I'd like to get on the payroll quickly and have my investigative skills bolstered and strengthened by the dignity of this great paper. Please advise me of your word limits and deadlines, and I'll get the article written up posthaste.

Sincerely,

Concerned (and Attentive) Citizen

* There was actually a UFO hovering over the platform during this event, too, but I think I'll save that for my next article. As fate would have it, no one else noticed it, so - lucky you! - you'll get a national scoop on that one too!

"They have reconstituted themselves"

Wow, you'd think that the Al Qaeda in Afghanistan were really dehydrated. Obama makes them sound like powdered milk.

Silliest lame comeback of the entire debate: "Well, I have a bracelet too..."

Stuff and nonsense

Last week I came across this website, and have been mulling over The Story of Stuff ever since. It's about a twenty-minute video, and well worth watching, although I don't appreciate the political potshots which the narrator takes toward the beginning.

(I don't necessarily agree with her assumptions about the limited amount of resources or 'our fair share' of the planetary pie. I guess it comes down to a fundamental difference in worldview - an atheist/evolutionist will see things in the light of chance and survival of the fittest, in which we'd better play the best with the cards we've been dealt, while I believe that God gave us this earth to take dominion over, and provided the resources needed to sustain life in His image. So I'm a little irritated by her trite statistics about the percentage of polluted waterways and the square miles of Amazon rainforest chopped down every day. Treating the water supply and the forests as a finite resource, the draining of which is exacerbated by a growing world population, instead of as a renewable resource that simply needs to be managed better, is a typical alarmist cliche. I am sure that there is irresponsible logging going on out there, but coming from Oregon, where the logging industry is a mainstay and the loggers, realising and respecting this fact - and not wanting to work themselves out of a job - consistently replant at or above replacement level, I tend to resent the all-too-common assumption that cutting down trees is synonymous with trashing the planet.)

Back to The Story of Stuff. Once I got past her alarmist propaganda, I found the rest of the video gripping and enlightening. I am astounded by the notion that our current economic model of rampant consumerism was a deliberate scheme, concocted and constructed according to plan. Apparently the economic advisers of the Eisenhower administration, in drawing up a blueprint for the American economy coming out of the post-war boom, envisioned a long-term model of ever-growing prosperity and expansion, industrialisation and consumption. They developed a shift in the consumer mentality by the precise implementation of planned obsolescence and perceived obsolescence.

Planned obsolescence is when things are designed to be thrown away, so the consumer always has to keep coming back for more. You can see this principle at work with the obvious disposables such as paper goods, diapers, and the like. (Prior to WWII, disposables were almost unheard-of; cloth diapers, personal care and linens were the norm.) Nowadays, we've moved so far away from that notion that we even have such ridiculous 'convenience' items as disposable mops, toilet scrubbers, and, apparently, BBQ grills. (?!?)

More subtle is the planned obsolescence of poor quality goods purporting to be reusable but so cheaply made that they will break often enough to keep the consumer buying and buying again. It's all a cleverly orchestrated balance between having the goods break quickly enough to ensure a steady demand while lasting just long enough to ensure that the consumers will not lose faith in the product. Our expectations have been re-programmed, and we no longer hope for the durability and quality from long-term goods that were the norm a generation or so ago. Hence the very true expression, 'They just don't make them like they used to.' No, and it's no accident.

Perceived obsolescence is simply the cultural pressure to buy a new one, even if the old one isn't broken or dysfunctional. This is the driving force behind fashion, sleek newer cars, bigger houses, and the like. Surely some scientific improvements come with time, but for the most part, the need to buy new stuff is merely imaginary.

The whole thing is very, very annoying to me.