Claude Levi-Strauss Dies

Depressing French Climate

Claude Levi-Strauss died last week at the tender age of 100, which means he was born during the presidency of Theodore Roosevelt, not that Levi-Strauss would have cared: He was a Frenchman, not an American and Roosevelt had as little impact on his life as Bridget Bardot has had on mine.

Because it rains all the time in France, it is not easy for a Frenchman to be happy.  Living in the dank French climate was probably why Levi-Strauss wrote, “The world began without the human race and will certainly end without it.”

Come to think of it, the climate may well end up being the reason the world might end without humans.

But surely Levi-Strauss would have been happier had he followed Steve Martin’s advice to writers and moved to California.  According to Martin, a good dose of Pacific Standard Time will cheer up any writer. As an example Martin took a passage from the Czech writer Milan Kundera; one almost as depressing as Levi-Strauss’s:

Most people deceive themselves with a pair of faiths: they believe in eternal memory (of people, things, deeds, nations) and in redressibility (of deeds, mistakes, sins, wrongs).  Both are false faiths.  In reality the opposite is true: everything will be forgotten and nothing will be redressed.

Czechoslovakia’s climate is every bit as rainy and cloudy as France’s. Sitting in his sunny, happy southern Californian (PST) garden Martin rewrote Kundera’s paragraph into:

I feel pretty,
Oh so pretty,
I feel pretty, and witty, and bright.

Still, if Levi-Strauss was right, so too was Kundera and no amount of California sunshine will fix it.

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The 1949 photo of Paris in the rain was taken by Benjamen Chinn.  Steve Martin’s philosophy of writing can be found in his essay for The New Yorker entitled “Writing is Easy!” republished in Fierce Pajamas:  An Anthology of Humorous Writing From the New Yorker.

2009 World Series

I’m not much of a sports fan now, but I was when I was a child and  I’ve hated the New York Yankees ever since they beat my Milwaukee Braves in the 1958 World Series.  Not that I hold a grudge, you understand.

I was a baseball player myself as a child.  I played first base in Little League.  They put me there because I was too slow for anything else. Later I would learn that slow is sometimes good, as when lovemaking, drinking fine wine, and watching sunsets, but it is not good in baseball.

I also couldn’t hit worth beans, so I crouched really low in the hopes that the pitcher wouldn’t be able to find a strike zone. Because I was such a lousy hitter, I was at the end of the batting order.  One time I hit a single. After I got on base, our lead-off hitter walked, which sent me down to second base.

So there I was, standing on second base, a place that I had never been before, enjoying the view — you can see all kinds of things from second base that you can’t see anywhere else on a baseball diamond — when our next batter ripped a pitch into deep deep right field. We didn’t have a outfield fence so a well-hit ball just rolled on forever across the pasture, until it hit a cow patty or an outfielder caught up with it.

So I left second base and headed for third, as fast as my slow little legs would carry me.  But what should have been a three-run home run for my team turned out to be a triple play for the other team, because I was so slow that both my teammates behind me on the base path caught up with me at third base and you can’t have three runners on one base —  it’s against the rules — so all three of us were out and that was the end of the inning.  I don’t remember whether I ever got to third base again in my baseball career, but I suspect that was the day when, in my childish mind, it first dawned on me that I’d never play for the Braves or the Yankees and that I would need to find a different career.

Baseball is an elegiac sport.  If you don’t believe me, rent the movie “Field of Dreams.”  And, if there is a heaven and if I get there, I’ll take Jenny DiMaggio, our ball-playing Border collie, to see the Yankees play the Braves. Every game will be an all-time, all-star game.  Derek Jeter and Tony Kubek will turn double plays for the Yankees, throwing to Lou Gehrig at first.  Joe DiMaggio, Mickey Mantle and Babe Ruth will watch as Henry Aaron and Eddie Mathews lift home runs over their heads into the stands.  I’ll be able to hear Yogi Berra’s jokes behind home plate as Whitey Ford and Mariano Rivera throw pitches past lesser Braves’ batters and Joe Torre and Del Crandall will take turns catching for Warren Spahn, Lew Burdette, and Greg Maddux.  Red Barber will call the games and Red Smith will write about them.             .

And the games will be played, as baseball games should be, on sunny afternoons.  Night games, caused by the baleful influence of television and all the money it brings, will be a thing of the distant past.

Oh, one more thing: Since it will be heaven, the Yankees will lose, at least some of the time.

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For more on the 2009 World Series I recommend this from Thomas Boswell of the Washington Post.

“Stuck” by Raymond Chandler

Raymond Chandler never blogged.  The art form of the blog — that wasn’t a snicker I just heard, was it? — hadn’t been invented yet.  But Chandler would never have been at a lost for something to write about, like I am sometimes.  In fact, he had some pretty good advice for writers, all of whom get stuck from time to time:

“When in doubt, have two guys come through the door with guns.”

So, without further ado. . . .

 

Two guys come through the door with guns.

 

 

The Lord’s Prayer

Christians are taught to pray the Lord’s Prayer which begins, “Our Father, who art in heaven.”  In other words, Christians pray to an authority figure who lives somewhere else, a place no one can even visit in this life. The prayer signals that this authority figure is insecure and needs lots of praise.  So Christians must first remind him that his name is “hallowed”; that it is His will that must be done; and that His is the kingdom, the power, and the glory for ever and ever. In fact, of the 69 words in this beautiful prose-poem of prayer, only 31 words are humans asking anything of this supernatural power and all but seven of those beg this authority figure for abstract forgiveness for our evil, fallen ways. The only material thing asked for is a piece of bread.

Navajos pray a little differently. For them, I suspect, heaven is right here, right now and their holy people a little more self-confident and less stern. This is how Navajos pray:

In the house made of dawn,
In the house made of evening twilight,
In the house made of dark cloud and rain
In beauty I walk.

With beauty before and behind me,
With beauty below and above,
With beauty all around me, I walk

Remind me: Which is the “primitive”  religion?

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The photo of the Navajo sandpainting (ca. 1900) comes from the Library of Congress’s “American Memory” web site.

Punditry

Punditry, the ability to render opinions whether founded or not, makes money for a select few who are willing to put their opinions before the public.  Mostly, no one ever checks up on the pundits after the fact.  (Except for William Safire, who checked up on himself once a year.) It seems to be an occupation where no mistake goes punished.  Wrong often, pundits just keep opining away and getting paid for it. Some even pun while doing it.

Which is why I was excited to discover that the Washington Post is having a pundit contest.  All you had to do was render an opinion about something, send it in, and wait to hear if you made the final 10 contestants.  You might even get an expense paid trip to D.C. if you became a finalist.

And, if you won, you got to pen thirteen pieces which will be on the Post’s web page and maybe even in the print version of the paper.  Plus you would be paid $200 per piece.

A Blogger’s dream.

Sadly, I only found out about the contest two days before it ended and I was on the road.  The last evening of the contest I wrote a piece, thinking I could submit it before the midnight (EDT) deadline.

I didn’t reckon with the internet connection from the hotel. Down.  The whole evening.

So, even though I didn’t get to enter, here is the pundit piece I woulda, coulda, submitted.  But, sigh, now nobody – including President Obama – will read my wise words.

Well, that’s not true.  You will read them.   I hope.

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Unforced Errors

Now that President Obama’s futile Copenhagen trip to boost Chicago for the 2016 Olympics is over and the trip fades from the public mind, it is time for an appraisal.

New presidents are prone to unforced errors.  Like athletes who bumble a grounder, fumble a football, or slam a tennis ball into the net, presidents often make mistakes that appear unnecessary.
Abraham Lincoln’s Powhatan fumble and John Kennedy’s Bay of Pigs bumble spring to mind. But such errors are learning opportunities for presidents.  Lincoln never again was careless about transmitting orders and Kennedy learned skepticism about experts and both became much more careful about their advisers.  President Obama should learn as much from the Copenhagen trip.

In the future he should pay more attention to that adviser or advisers who told him not to go.  Presumably he got advice such as, “Mr. President, you should not go for at least three reasons.  First, the political mosquitoes will trumpet a defeat and while the conservative commentators are no more than mosquitoes, even a mosquito can carry a deadly disease.  Second, we can’t count the votes so we don’t know if Chicago will win.  If you lose, the political professionals on Capitol Hill are going to question our ability to count votes.  Finally, leaders around the world are apt to draw the wrong conclusions and make dangerous mistakes in the future.  Like the Soviet Politburo did with Kennedy, they may decide that you are not a strong leader and don’t have good political judgment.  North Korea, Iran, and Pakistan are just a few countries who could make misjudgments about more serious matters. The story will be off the front pages in a few days but the perceptions will last and perceptions create their own realities.

Some of Kennedy's Untrusted Advisers

“There is too much at stake for you to go to Copenhagen, especially when you are going again soon for a climate change summit that matters much more.  The Copenhagen Olympic meeting is why you have a Secretary of Commerce.  Send him, whatever his name is.”

Assuming President Obama had advisers who said something like that, he needs to pay more attention to them next time. If no one told him, he needs some new advisers.

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Contestants also had to submit 100 words on why the Post should select them.  Here is mine.

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You should select me so I can resolve several modern riddles.  For instance, I know what to do about Afghanistan (teaser – Kashmir), global climate change (hint – atoms), health care (No more hints.  I don’t work for free.), the economy, and America’s cultural decline.

In addition, you should hire me because I love to write but have no editor. I whine about this deficiency on both blogs that I keep.  (http://goldenstate.wordpress.com/ and http://fatfinch.wordpress.com/ )

Besides, for a short time only, my writing is on sale: Only $200 for 800 words.  Don’t wait!  These special prices won’t last forever!
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Here is some humorous advice for modern pundits from a modern pundit.

Afghanistan and the Spanish Civil War

Rereading George Orwell’s memoir of his experiences in the Spanish Civil War reminded me of the current debate about what to do next in Afghanistan.  A relative thinks we should just “win.”  Unfortunately, nobody knows what that means.  Orwell had a clear-eyed view of what is and what is not possible in war and was scathing about news coverage of wars.  He not only went to Spain to cover the war as a journalist, he enlisted in the fight against the fascists and was shot.  Here is what he had to say about war debates:

“One of the most horrible features of war is that the war-propaganda, all the screaming and lies and hatred, comes invariably from people who are not fighting.”

Return from Big Ditch

Returning to the work-a-day world from the Grand Canyon is like reading a Dan Brown novel after watching Hamlet.

But, here I am, so I had better make the best of it.

I had intended to regale you with an analysis of the “dog-fighting” case argued last week in the Supreme Court but Dahlia Lithwick of Slate beat me to it and did it better than I could. Read it here and enjoy laughing.  Not much suspense in how that case is going to turn out.

And, from the satiric Onion, comes this photo along with the headline that the Supreme Court has been ordered to remove the tip jars from its bench.  And the humorous faux news that Justice Sotomayor did not escape jury duty.

And the real news that the Supreme Court was not interested in the glass dildo case.  Really.

Brief Hiatus

The Golden State will take a brief hiatus until Monday, October 12th.  We’re off to the Big Ditch, also known as the Grand Canyon for a three-day backpack.

Another First Monday in October

It’s the first Monday in October again, President Obama is back from his unforced error in Copenhagen, we’ve survived the first New York Times Sunday Magazine knowing that we are deprived permanently of William Safire’s “On Language” column — or would that read better if I split the infinitive and wrote “are permanently deprived” ? — and the Supreme Court is back in town, ready to render several 5-4 decisions before the new term ends.

At the New York Times, Adam Liptak, who replaced Linda Greenhouse as the Times Supreme Court reporter, wrote a good synopsis of many of the business cases before the Court this year and did it without once using the word “liberal” for which he is to be congratulated.  Eva Rodriguez of the Washington Post reviewed the docket and managed the same feat.  Kudos to her.

By next June, we should have some idea of whether the word can be applied to Justice Sotomayor.  Early indications are that she too will be a moderate, but we’ll have to wait to know for certain.  In the meantime, we’ll soldier on, waiting for the day when the word “liberal” will once again be useful in describing Supreme Court justices.

Your Car Insurance

IN THE SURREAL COURT OF NEW MEXICO

Benson, et.al., Plaintiffs v. All-Hands Insurance Co., Defendant.

JUSTICE HEMLOCK delivered the opinion of the Court.

In what turned out not to be a very good idea, Mark Benson decided to go have a drink with his friend Bill Edmunson.  Driving in Benson’s car, they headed to Angelino’s bar, about ten miles south of Troutsville, New Mexico, the small town in which they lived.

They had several beers and then several more.  When the time came to leave, both were desperately drunk.  Somehow, in their alcohol-induced stupor, they decided that Edmunson was in better shape to drive, so Benson gave him the keys to his car and sat in the front passenger seat.

About three miles up the road, Edmunson drove Benson’s car into a stately — and innocent — Ponderosa Pine tree, causing massive damage to the car and personal injuries to both its drunken inhabitants. Benson’s injuries were minor, but Edmunson’s were significant.  Nothing in the record before us discloses what happened to the tree, but trees lack standing to sue, so that doesn’t matter.  See Sierra Club v. Morton, 405 U.S. 727 (1972), Douglas, J., dissenting at 741 et seq.

Benson had no car insurance.  Edmunson did, but they were not in Edmunson’s car; they were in Benson’s.  All-Hands Insurance Corporation was Edmunson’s insurer.  He also had uninsured motorist coverage as a part of that All-Hands policy. Benson, the one with no insurance, sued All-Hands for his injuries and the damage to his car.  Edmunson piled on, suing All-Hands for his injuries.  And they sued each other too.

Confronted with two drunks, both demanding money from it, the insurance company balked. The law required Benson to have insurance on his car and he didn’t.  Edmunson was also guilty.  He drove an uninsured car.  (The learned trial judge was absolutely right to ignore his pleas that he didn’t know that the car was uninsured.  The statute is clear: “No person shall drive an uninsured motor vehicle.”  Ignorance is no excuse.)

The trial judge agreed with All-Hands and dismissed the claims against it, leaving the two impecunious drunks to duke it out alone. This appeal followed.

A.

We begin with the scofflaw Benson; required by state law to have insurance, he had none. But that doesn’t answer the question before us: Can he recover for his injuries from Edmunson’s insurance company?  Edmunson complied with the law and bought insurance.  That insurance policy covered Edmonson from any liability he might have to other people.  Benson is such a person under Edmunson’s policy and, if Edmunson caused his damages, he can recover from All-Hands.

So Benson can recover his minor damages from Edmunson and All-Hands has to pay.  What about Edmunson?  Can he recover for his significant injuries?

B.

Edmunson’s policy insured anyone to whom he might become liable.  But Edmunson can’t be liable to himself for any number of reasons, not the least of which is that, if he sued himself, the case caption would be Edmunson v. Edmunson and lawyers would assume it was a divorce case and not read our opinion and what good are our opinions if nobody reads them? See generally,  Winchester, “Freedom of Speech, Corporations, and Cats.”

Edmunson’s insurance policy does not protect him from his own negligence, it only protects others from his negligence. Any other outcome would allow Edmunson to sue himself and he can’t do that.  This court does not rewrite contracts and this insurance contract says that Edmunson is not insured against himself.

Expecting that ruling, Edmunson has another argument in his quiver: If he isn’t insured under his primary policy, that means he is “uninsured” and can therefore recover from his “Uninsured Motorist” coverage!  That argument fares as well as the olive in my martini will this evening.

New Mexico, Edmunson says, has a strong public policy underlying its requirement that everybody ought to have coverage against uninsured drivers.  He has the gall to quote our own words to us:

In New Mexico, it is statutorily mandated that insurance companies include in     automobile policies uninsured coverage. . . . See § 66-5-301(A), (C). This requirement embodies a strong public policy “to expand insurance coverage and to protect individual members of the public against the hazard of culpable uninsured motorists.” See Romero v. Dairyland Ins. Co., 111 N.M. 154, 156, 803 P.2d 243, 245 (1990).

Well.  It is true that Edmunson was uninsured against his own bad driving but that is his fault, no one else’s.  We presume that All-Hands would have sold him insurance against himself had he offered to pay for it. (In states with “no-fault” auto insurance laws, All-Hands sells exactly that kind of policy called, “Personal Injury Protection.”) Edmunson cannot be heard to complain about the law in New Mexico.  If he doesn’t like it here, he can move.  We don’t care.

Besides, All-Hands is a corporation and Mr. Edmunson is merely a natural person.  Corporations are creatures of the law.  We must treat them every bit as well — if not better —  as we treat real persons. Mr. Edmunson is one of God’s creatures and we leave it to God to decide what to do with him.  All-Hands Corporation is one of our creations and we take care of our own.  Mr. Edmunson cannot recover anything from All-Hands even though he’s the one who paid for the insurance and complied with the law.

We know that the laity may grumble about this result, thinking it unfair.  After all, we are punishing Edmunson, who obeyed the law and rewarding the scofflaw Benson, who didn’t. But the law follows logic where ever it leads.  Justice Holmes twice wrote that the life of the law has not been logic but experience.  Balderdash!  (Justice Holmes is overrated anyway.  Wrong about logic, he was also wrong about many other things.  For examples see, Buck v. Bell (mandatory sterilization),  Adkins v. Childrens’ Hospital (women), Schenk v. U.S. (arson), and especially wrong about corporations and illegal monopolization, American Banana Co. v. United Fruit.)

The law and logic of this case flow on like the Mississippi in full flood, inexorable, irresistible, but not always benignant, and we go where it takes us.

AFFIRMED IN PART, REVERSED IN PART.

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DISCLAIMER
The persons (natural and unnatural) portrayed in this fake judicial opinion are fictitious.  Any resemblance between them and any living person is coincidental.  The law described in the opinion may not be the law in your state, however, if you think you are covered by your own insurance policy for your own negligent driving, go read your policy and think again.