It was only a matter of time, I guess. A new edition of Twain’s classic Huckleberry Finnwill be coming out minus the offending n-word, which will be replaced by the term “slave.”
In related news, the same edition will eliminate the word “Injun.” I can’t find a report of what term will replace it; perhaps nothing.
Alan Gribben, a Twain scholar who is behind the new Bowdlerized version, believes he had to change Huck in order to save him from oblivion; the PC police have spearheaded multiple and successful drives to ban the book, all because of the n-word. The publisher of the new version calls the revised terminology “less hurtful, less controversial,” but it’s certainly controversial among Twain literature lovers.
It’s funny, isn’t it, how at this point children’s minds are deemed too sensitive to withstand the barrage of the n-word in a classic book, even when the thrust of the book is to show the innate humanity and worthiness of the person in question. But at the same time their ears are not deemed too delicate to be exposed to a steady diet of the n-word in rap music. And most of this latter-day use of the word is by black people themselves, in songs that are often offensive in many other ways as well. It’s enough to make your head spin.
Susan Jacoby has a lot of relatives who lived to be old. Mega-old, in fact. And, from what she’s seen of the debilities of extreme old age, she doesn’t much like the prospect of getting there herself.
Oh, it’s okay if mental and physical health are intact. Most of us like to think that, were we to live well into our 90s, we’d also be living well. But most of us like to think a lot of things that aren’t all that likely.
On the bright side, it’s not impossible to make it to the 100-year mark with a fair amount of vigor, and faculties largely intact or at least functioning. In fact, half of centenarians are not significantly disabled by dementia or physical illness; the other half are.
With a mother who’s pushing 97, I’ve witnessed a lot of the 90-plus segment of the population. There’s no question that some are living active, happy lives, although I can’t seem to conjure up any statistics just now on what percentage of the whole they might represent. I do know that the conditions of extreme old age vary enormously from person to person, with some living a life that in their younger days they would have begged to be released from, and some hale and hearty and going strong.
My mother, fortunately (knock wood) is somewhere in that huge area in-between, but fairly functional and fairly happy, and seemingly well-cared-for in assisted living. She sometimes expresses surprise at still being alive, but also says she’s quite content to be so. But I’ve seen her lose almost every friend she ever had (and she had plenty) and most of her acquaintances, too, and that’s hard.
My mother once told me that her own grandfather, born in the early 1870s and fairly healthy till he died at 93, used to remark wistfully, “It’s hard to be the last leaf on the tree.” I think she may obliquely be saying the same thing. But, thankfully, she’s nevertheless glad she’s still sticking around.
It’s an act of theater, because Obama has veto power and would almost undoubtedly use it. And repeal is doomed in the Senate, anyway. But it’s nevertheless a good idea to try, because a vote would force members to lay their cards on the table. It will be especially interesting to see what House Democrats from purplish districts will do.
Another task for the new session: investigations by the oversight committee, including Fannie Mae, Wikileaks, corruption in Afghanistan, and FDA recalls.
And then there’s the filibuster and what’s known as “reform.” I don’t even know which article to link to on that topic, there are so very many calls (now that the Democrats have only a slim majority) for changes. The goal is to make it easier to pass legislation in the Senate by simple majority, through making it harder for the minority to block such votes.
This could come back to bite the Dems in two ways. The first is obvious: if they lose that majority in the next election, the rule change will come to favor the Republicans. The second way is perhaps a little less obvious: a few of the Democrats in the Senate are so-called moderates who might be persuaded to vote with Republicans if they see it as benefiting their own re-election chances in 2012 (see this list of those up for re-election in 2012). If the Republicans are united in their votes, and even just a few Democrats join them, then the Democrat leadership might come to regret those reforms.
…but it’s not the stupid thing that some on the right have accused him of saying.
First, watch the video:
Now, what he didn’t say. He didn’t say the Constitution has no binding power. His statement was in answer to a question about reading the Constitution aloud in Congress; the act of reading has no binding power, according to Klein, and is merely a gimmick—although that does sound rather deprecating, and he probably wishes now he’d kept his mouth shut.
Nor did he say that interpreting the Constitution is “impossible.”
But Klein did say the following stupid thing:
The issue of the Constitution is that the text is confusing because it was written more than 100 years ago.
Ezra Klein is young. Very young, as I’ve written about at some length here. Why he has been hired by many of the supposed heavy hitters of the MSM as a major political commentator, I’ll never know. His errors are often those of youth, and this case is no exception.
The Constitution is not confusing because it is old. If you don’t believe me, Ezra, ask members of the current Congress to devise a clearer one and see what they’ll come up with in the new 20,000-plus page document that would undoubtedly result.
Legal documents of any length must nearly always be interpreted when they are applied in the real world; that’s one of the main functions of our court system. Longer and more specific is not necessarily better, and older documents at least have accrued a host of common law cases on which to rely when interpretation is necessary.
Klein also implies that interpretation is arbitrary, and each side is merely seeing in the Constitution what it wishes to see. But the Constitution is not merely a blank slate onto which people can project their own wishes. There is a host of evidence of the intent of the original authors, for example. Those who want to expand the reach of the Constitution beyond that are doing something qualitatively different than those who consider themselves contructionists.
It’s not just a difference about what people “want to get done.” It’s usually about wanting to expand the reach of government versus wanting to restrict it. There are powers enumerated to the federal government in the Constitution, and one might say that the disagreement is about extending and expanding those powers because people on the left want to “get things done,” and keeping limits on those powers because people on the right believe that’s just the sort of tyranny the founders wisely wanted to prevent by writing the Constitution and limiting those powers in the first place.
The results of the Grande Conservative Blogress Diva Contest have been announced, and they’re not too shabby after all. Due to complexities too complex to describe here, Robin of Berkeley is Diva and there were two regents named this year, myself and Clarice Feldman. So I retain my title.
Couldn’t have done it without you. Thanks!
And Happy New Year! Have you kept your resolutions?
I’d never been to one before—you know, one of those concerts that specializes in 60s music. And I probably wouldn’t have gone to this one had it not been free.
But there I was, standing because all the seats were already taken. As I waited for the music to begin, I looked around at the sea of people in the audience. There were some young ones, to be sure, but it was mostly a motley crew of gray-haired or balding and generally-gone-to-seed boomers ready to rock and roll.
Soon the crowd was bouncing around to the music, and singing because we all knew the words. The most active were my fellow standees. A heavyset woman next to me had all the moves of the go-go dancers on Shindig and Hullaballo, a genre I hadn’t thought of in many a long year. She was doing some amalgam of the twist, the frug, the jerk, the mashed potato, and the monkey, complete with saucy head tosses. Don’t ask me to explain, but somehow it all worked.
As I gazed at the crowd, particularly some couples dancing together and smooching a bit, I suddenly pictured these same people, forty-odd years earlier, at a rock concert of ages past. Young, slim, long hair restored to its original vibrant colors, faces unlined and glowing with hope and/or drugs—there they were, the young boomers of the 60s, with their lives all ahead of them and sure to be just wonderful.
Well, they’re still dancin’, anyway; if not in the streets, then in the seats:
Tensions have been running high between Egypt’s Muslim majority and minority Christians.
The U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom said in November that 10 Coptic Christian homes and several businesses were burned and looted in Qena province in southern Egypt following rumors of a romantic relationship between a Christian man and Muslim woman. Security officials imposed a curfew and arrested several Muslims, the commission said.
This appears to be an escalation of that conflict. The Christians of Egypt (an ancient denominiation known as Copts) were specifically targeted in a statement by an al Qaeda affiliate with strong Iraqi ties back in October, and security for Copt churches was beefed up after that. But not enough; it can probably never be enough.
Egypt’s president Mubarak denounced the present attack as one on Egypt by foreign elements, and perhaps this is so. It wouldn’t be the first time, either. He said:
This sinful act is part of a series of efforts to drive a wedge between Copts and Muslims…It was a terrorist operation which carries, within itself, the hallmark of foreign hands which want to turn Egypt into another scene of terrorism like elsewhere in the region and the wider world.
Terrorism is a tool with a great many purposes. There is the simple joy of destruction, the rejoicing in the death of enemies. With suicide attacks—and it is thought this was one—there is also the supposed reward of martyrdom. There is the sowing of fear among the targeted population. There is the need for authorities to spend increased, expensive, and difficult time and effort to thwart future attacks. There is the inconvenience to the rest of the population as these measures impact their lives. There is the terrorist hope of a repressive countermove by the government that will further enrage Muslims and cause more to support the terrorists. And lastly there is the desire to provoke a backlash from the population to increase conflict and bloodshed between the two groups.
And all for the price of a bomb and a couple of willing terrorist lives lost.
Here it comes again, the day it’s obligatory to have a rollicking good time.
Why, I’m not so sure. Perhaps because the passage of the years can be depressing, especially after the age of forty or so. Or perhaps it’s because we have to learn to write a different number on our checks, just when we’ve finally gotten used to the old one.
As for tonight, I’m planning to journey to one of those towns that has decided to ignore the fact that New Years Eve occurs in winter, and that the venue is New England, and so it’s usually so cold that no one wants to go anywhere. But go we do, to a place where the local kidees show off their talents, and the local musicians and actors and clowns and what-have-yous do the same, only less cutely.
I remember one memorable New Years Eve of -5 degrees and not inconsiderable wind; whatever was I thinking going out? This year the forecast is not nearly that bad. I’ll go out, I’ll walk around, I’ll see some folks, I’ll come back in. Sounds like a plan.
And then there are the resolutions. This year I’ve fastened on a single one: to go to bed earlier. But just cause there’s only one doesn’t mean I’ll have any less trouble keeping it. I’ve always been a tremendous nightowl, and being a blogger hasn’t helped me any in my (admittedly weak) efforts to change my nightowl proclivities.
