Barackface

Thursday, December 20, 2012

Modi's Night

a state poll that has taken on the flavor of a national referendum. ..... he will cement his position as India's leading opposition politician and its top contender to succeed Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ..... Modi is the messiah who will rid Indian politics of sloth, corruption, and petty identity politics. With his no-nonsense management style and inspirational leadership, only he can deliver the economic development Indians crave ..... For his equally vocal detractors, Modi is forever tarred by anti-Muslim riots that occurred 10 years ago ..... his reputation as the country's best economic administrator and most business-friendly politician .... the chief minister is that rarest of creatures in India: a politician more interested in public service than in pelf or promoting his progeny. .... In a land swaddled with red tape, Modi is seen as a go-getter. In a culture of inherited privilege -- where politicians tend to hand down power to their children like a family heirloom -- the chief minister comes from humble stock and has risen through dint of effort. He began his career helping an uncle run a railway-station tea stall in his hometown and then worked his way up the ranks of the Hindu-nationalist group Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (National Volunteer Corps) and its sister organization, the BJP, before being catapulted to the chief minister's job in 2001. .... He's one of India's few politicians -- Singh is another -- whose declaration of a meager net worth (about $245,000) doesn't evoke guffaws of disbelief. .... The state has averaged double-digit growth rates over much of Modi's 11-year rule. With only 5 percent of India's population, last year Gujarat accounted for 16 percent of the country's manufacturing and 22 percent of its exports. The Economist calls it India's Guangdong. .... While much of India continues to suffer from potholed roads and daily brownouts, Gujarat offers investors modern highways and a reliable power supply. Many of India's tycoons have lavished praise on Modi for running an administration responsive to their needs. In 2008, Modi famously persuaded Ratan Tata to build the Nano, the world's cheapest car, in Gujarat after Tata Motors ran into land-acquisition troubles in West Bengal. Every two years, Indian and global businesses line up at the Vibrant Gujarat summit to pledge billions of dollars to the state in India's most high-profile investor gathering. Foreign companies that have set up shop in Gujarat under Modi, or announced plans to do so, include Abbott, Bombardier, Ford, Peugeot, and Suzuki. ....... a strong following among the pan-Indian middle class and the Indian diaspora. A poll by India Today this year declared Modi the country's top pick for prime minister: 24 percent of respondents chose him, compared to 17 percent who preferred Rahul Gandhi. ...... Traffic at a Google Plus "hangout" featuring Modi in August reportedly crashed the website's servers. Many of Modi's most fervent supporters are hypernationalists who seem to view opposition to him as unpatriotic. ..... garnered the third-most votes worldwide in Time magazine's annual poll to help choose the "100 most influential people" in the world. But though 256,828 people plumped for Modi -- about 10 times the number who picked U.S. President Barack Obama -- even more (266,739 people) gave the chief minister a thumbs-down. ..... For his part, Modi stoutly denies any wrongdoing and says he should be hanged if found guilty. In April, an investigation ordered by the Supreme Court cleared him of culpability for the riots ..... while Gujarat has grown fast, other states have grown faster still .... Most states that have grown faster than Gujarat either are much smaller or are starting from a much lower base. ..... No other Indian chief minister stands up publicly for the idea of small government, fiscal responsibility, getting the government out of business, and providing people jobs rather than handouts. ..... Narendra Modi may well be India's best chief minister. But he'd still make a terrible choice for prime minister.

Gujarat's economy: India's Guangdong

So many things work properly in Gujarat that it hardly feels like India..... There is constant electricity, gas and abundant water. The state government, he says, kept red tape to a minimum, did not ask for bribes, and does not interfere much now. .... Most of the men, the villagers say, work for small industrial firms for a wage about 50% higher than they would get in the fields. The road to Ahmedabad, Gujarat's main city, is privately operated and boasts four lanes. It passes through a countryside that is visibly industrialising. ...... It might yet play the role of industrial locomotive for the country, as Guangdong province did for China in the 1990s. There is lots of excited talk about exporters switching from China to India. Sanjay Lalbhai, the chairman of Arvind, a textiles maker and clothing retailer based in Ahmedabad, says such a move is "imminent" in his industry. ..... The state government uses the usual tricks to try to jump-start growth, including special economic zones. ..... less onerous labour laws, passable roads, reliable electricity and effective bureaucracy. ...... Gujarat could be a vision of India's future, in which manufacturing flourishes, soaking up rural labour. Its economy is expected to grow by double digits, even as India's rate slows to 7-8% this year. The state may also be a springboard for Mr Modi, who may contest the national leadership of the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party

Modi to plan BJP’s 2014 battle from CM office

there is buzz in the party’s central office about how to leverage the man who has emerged the most important figure in the party gallery. There is also ambivalence about Modi on the way to become numero uno in the party. ..... The BJP enthusiasts of Modi feel that the Gujarat strongman will make mincemeat of the Gandhi scion in a duel between the two. ..... the choice of making Modi the campaign committee chairman. ..... Asked as to who would replace Modi in Gujarat and who is the second most important person in the state BJP, the reticent office-bearer said that there is no second man in the state party hierarchy, and that Modi occupies all the slots from “1 to 1001”. Modi will not leave his chief minister’s office in Gandhinagar until after victory in the Lok Sabha election. It is for this reason that there is talk of giving him a role in the poll campaign without disturbing the set-up either in Gandhinagar or in New Delhi.

88 per cent of 35,808 India Today website survey users LIKE Modi

Out of the nearly 35,808 votes polled till 9 am on Thursday, 87.5 per cent netizens liked him as the leader of the state .... The survey findings, in fact, indicate that he might look beyond the political boundaries of the state and might go ahead to achieve his prime ministerial aspirations as an NDA candidate in the 2014 general election.

Record 70.2 per cent voter turnout in Gujarat Assembly polls, says CEC
Modi, touted as PM candidate, set for Indian poll win

Election results due in the Indian state of Gujarat on Thursday are likely to seal Hindu nationalist Narendra Modi's status as a frontrunner in 2014 national polls....... Gujarat, which has a population of 60 million people ..... He campaigned during the state election on a platform of economic expansion and investment. .... "The development in Gujarat is only but a manifestation of good governance"

Gujarat elections: The rise of Narendra Modi

As a child, he runs away from home and heads to north India, living with sadhus - or holy men - for months before returning to Gujarat in the late 1960s to serve steaming cups of tea alongside one of his brothers at a stall in Ahmedabad. ..... To this day, the riots haunt Modi's government. In 2012, one of Modi's former ministers, Maya Kodnani, is sentenced to 28 years in jail alongside 30 others for the violence. ........ Gujarat today is one of India's wealthiest states and Modi's supporters credit him for bringing uninterrupted power supplies, smooth roads and a flood of investment to the state. ..... the 62-year-old is also an avid Twitter user ..... For the first time during campaigning in India, Modi uses 3-D projections of himself to appear "live" on stage at simultaneous events.

Exit poll predicts huge win for BJP's Narendra Modi in Gujarat Assembly elections

A post-poll survey today predicted a bigger victory margin for BJP in Gujarat Assembly elections as compared to the 2007 outcome, saying the ruling party could get 129 to 141 seats out of a total of 182. .... Congress is likely to get 37 to 45 seats in the Assembly with a vote share of 36 per cent against BJP's 48 per cent ..... In the 2007 Assembly polls, BJP had won in 117 seats while Congress had bagged 59.

Gujarat poll success imminent for Narendra Modi; PM candidature still under doubt

The forecasts range from around two-thirds seats to a landslide for the ruling BJP in the 182-seat Gujarat assembly, relegating the opposition Congress to even fewer seats than its tally of 59 in the 2007 polls.

Exit Polls Predict Landslide Victory for Modi

the BJP was likely to win between 118 and 140 seats, the Congress party a distant second with between 40 to 59 seats ..... Gross domestic product in the state has grown at an average of 9.59% in the five years to March 31, 2012, compared to the national average of 7.9% ...... Gujarat is home to several of India’s largest industrial projects, including the world’s largest oil refinery, run by Reliance Industries Ltd., and Tata Motors’ factory for its Nano mini-car. ...... Critics point to his links with Hindu right-wing groups and his administration’s failure to stop communal violence in his state in 2002 that killed over 1,000 people, mostly Muslim. This, they say, makes him unfit to lead a state, let alone a country as diverse as India. Mr. Modi has repeatedly denied any wrongdoing. He has tried to win over more of Gujarat’s Muslims through initiatives like last year’s three-day public fast for social harmony. .... Mr. Modi himself has never publicly stated his ambition to become prime minister. ...... “My impression is that he will not be acceptable. Other political parties in the NDA are not prepared to go with a person whom not a single Muslim will vote for” ..... Current BJP allies such as the Janata Dal (United) and the Telugu Desam Party are staunchly against him as a PM candidate because of his alleged links to the 2002 communal riots. Putting Mr. Modi as the BJP’s candidate for Prime Minister, may push these parties in the hands of the rival Congress party-led alliance

Why India Is Forced to Reform Its Economy
Will Narendra Modi's PM ambitions be boosted after Gujarat win?

a victory that could launch the prime ministerial ambitions of one of the country's most popular but controversial leaders.

Modi spent all Wednesday in office, clearing pending files

He also reviewed the preparations of Vibrant Gujarat Global Investors’ Summit - 2013..... More than 5,000 delegates from 100 countries are likely to participate in the biannual event. Japan and Canada are the partner countries for the 2013 summit. The event is scheduled on January 11, 12, 13 at Mahatma Mandir in Gandhinagar. This year, a facility for online signing of Memoranda of Understanding has been created. Innovative initiatives, small-scale industries and technology will be the focus areas of the summit.

Guj polls: Parties’ poll SMSes beeped on 1.5 crore mobiles

By the time campaigning for the first phase of assembly elections ended, BJP and Congress together had sent text or voice messages to about one lakh people in each constituency. ..... at the rate of 20 paise per message .... Gupta added that through candidates and friends, they had gathered leads of at least 80,000 mobile numbers in each constituency. ..... the messages sent by the BJP were routed through a Mumbai-based firm. Congress used a portal created by a Pune-based company to send its messages.

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

I thought Daniel Day Lewis was truly scary in Gangs Of New York. And I did not think Steven Spielberg capable of something this good. I mean, he has always been great. But Abraham Lincoln is not sci-fi exactly. And I almost did not go to the movie. Everyone knows every detail there is to know about Lincoln. Is that not so? And movies have a reputation of being less good than books. But this movie is well done. I read some reviews and decided to go.

This is first and foremost a movie about the craft of politics. I regret not having gone to see Avatar in the theater. I did not want to miss out on Lincoln. Because this, of all movies, is not about the storyline.

I guess I needed to see this movie to be able to better visualize the Lincoln I have met in books for decades. This is holography attempted in the time dimension. This movie is Gandhi.

Spielberg has shown he is capable of exploring the human, not just the extraterrestrial. Salute. The movie feels like getting to meet the 16th president in person. That's not something a book can do.

Movie Review: The Lincoln Movie is Propaganda

a 2.5 hour courtroom drama about slavery that never happened. .... The film focuses entirely on the final years of Lincoln’s life, from the tail end of the war to his inevitable assassination (spoiler alert). .... Sort of how “Passion of the Christ” allowed Mel Gibson to ignore anything Jesus actually taught. ..... Before the movie began Lincoln imposed a blockade on Southern ports with no declaration of war from Congress. He suspended habeas corpus, which is the protection against unlawful imprisonment. When a Chief Justice of the Supreme Court called this unconstitutional Lincoln signed his own arrest warrant for the Justice. He arrested an Ohio congressman for “disloyal sentiments and speeches” and imprisoned an estimated 13,000 Northern (not Southern) citizens, including hundreds of journalists, for opposing the war. No evidence. No trials. ..... The Emancipation Proclamation freed the slaves in the 10 Confederate states, but not in any of the Union states. ..... Most Northerners did not oppose slavery, in fact Lincoln explicitly supported slavery in his first inaugural address. ..... The fact of the matter is that it was disagreement over economic policy, not slavery, that was the motivation for secession and Northern aggression. ...... Lincoln was a political novice whose campaign was bankrolled by Northern industrialists. They aimed to hike taxes on the South to fund welfare for corporations in the North. Southern states felt bullied by the Northern majority, and preferred a policy of free trade ...... Lincoln wanted high import tariffs and high taxes to subsidize wealthy corporate campaign donors. The Confederacy wanted to create a free trade zone with no tariffs, low taxes and no corporate subsidies. ....... the South withdrew from the Union democratically ..... Every other country in the New World ended slavery without violence, with the exception of the Haitian Revolution, which was a slave revolt, not a civil war. The Civil War was essentially a very bloody tax revolt followed by a successful propaganda campaign.

Spielberg’s Lincoln: A Historian’s Review

Daniel Day Lewis is Abraham Lincoln. Having supposedly read over 100 books on Lincoln in preparation for the role, he manages to convincingly replicate many aspects of Lincoln’s persona and physical aura: Lincoln’s purportedly high voice, his wry sense of humor and knack for storytelling, his slouched posture and awkward gait, and the overwhelming weariness incurred by the “fiery trial” of war all ring true. ...... the stress of a wartime presidential marriage ..... her social training as a daughter of the Kentucky elite ..... Seward cuts patronage deals with lame duck Democratic Congressmen in order to help secure the passage of the 13th Amendment and acts as a sort of political muse to Lincoln. Seward harangues and cajoles Lincoln on policy and political strategy but ultimately serves as a loyal ally in carrying out Lincoln’s intent ...... the film is at times a taut political thriller and at times the inspirational story of the final abolition of American slavery. ..... Lincoln’s famously ambiguous views on slavery and racial equality. .... Spielberg risks reviving the Great Emancipator myth. The best evidence suggests that Abraham Lincoln personally abhorred slavery as an institution while simultaneously denying the concept of racial equality. ...... Lincoln viewed the Emancipation Proclamation and the enlistment of black troops as a wartime expedient to preserve the Union. ..... Lincoln’s personal beliefs underwent a significant change during the last year of the Civil War, and Lincoln did in fact suggest to the reconstructed government of Louisiana in 1864 that “very intelligent” black men and “those who have fought gallantly in our ranks” might be given access to the ballot box. ...... never became a radical abolitionist .... Lincoln continued to put forth plans for the resettlement of freedmen to the Caribbean even after issuing the Emancipation Proclamation and possibly even after the passage of the 13th Amendment. .... The one-dimensional black characters in Lincoln are unrecognizable as depictions of African Americans during the Civil War. ..... While Lincoln continued to insist that the war was a struggle to preserve the Union, African Americans did not wait for the Emancipation Proclamation to turn the war into much more than a sectional conflict. Slavery was destroyed as much by their individual actions as by the political workings of white politicians...... the movie does a poor job of identifying the various cabinet officials and Congressmen central to the plot .... On the whole, Spielberg’s Lincoln is a masterful politician and a dynamic character, able to carefully mediate between his own evolving beliefs and the political realities of his age. This interpretation falls solidly in line with the mainstream of Lincoln scholarship. For an incredibly complex, sphinxlike figure such as Abraham Lincoln, perhaps we shouldn’t expect a more thorough interpretation from Hollywood.

Spielberg's Lincoln is a blockbuster for the people – and for the Oscars

it has taken $62m, almost its entire production budget, in just two weeks..... It may be the year's most unlikely blockbuster. Of the three passes Spielberg has made at the subject of slavery – The Color Purple in 1982 and Amistad in 1997 – Lincoln is by far the least Spielbergian. .... 149 minutes of dense political maneuvering in dark smoke-filled rooms, as Lincoln hunts down the votes necessary to pass the 13th amendment. It's a film about process, a political procedural. ..... turned Jaws and ET into national events, and Saving Private Ryan into a generational salute ..... Not until Forrest Gump in 1993 could the academy bring itself to reward a film that made over $100m, thus opening up the way for Titanic and Lord of the Rings. .....The Hurt Locker, the lowest-grossing film ever to win the Academy Award for best picture

What’s True and False in “Lincoln” Movie

When the House of Representatives finally, dramatically votes to approve the 13th Amendment to the Constitution abolishing slavery, Washington erupts in celebration. Members of Congress weep, throw themselves into each other’s arms, and begin singing “Battle Cry of Freedom.” Men parade through the streets and church bells chime...... From time to time, even “Honest Abe” himself exaggerated or dissembled in pursuit of a great cause. ..... Lincoln may have given short, unmemorable speeches at countless flag-raising ceremonies in Washington ..... In one of the movie’s most riveting scenes, a trio of smarmy political operatives tells Lincoln they are having a hard time bribing undecided Congressmen to vote “yes” on the amendment because so many 50-cent pieces of the day bear the president’s unpopular likeness. ..... the Gettysburg Address .. did not achieve any semblance of a national reputation until the 20th century ..... Steven Spielberg provided the eloquent answer. “It’s a betrayal of the job of the historian,” he asserted, to explore the unknown. But it is the job of the filmmaker to use creative “imagination” to recover what is lost to memory. Unavoidably, even at its very best, “this resurrection is a fantasy ... a dream.” As Spielberg neatly put it, “one of the jobs of art is to go to the impossible places that history must avoid.” There is no doubt that Spielberg has traveled toward an understanding of Abraham Lincoln more boldly than any other filmmaker before him. ........ Lincoln had made corrupt bargains to win passage of the 13th Amendment. ...... Sometimes real history is as dramatic as great fiction. And when they converge at the highest levels, the combination is unbeatable.

A President Engaged in a Great Civil War

The legislative process — the linchpin of our system of checks and balances — is often treated with lofty contempt masquerading as populist indignation, an attitude typified by the aw-shucks antipolitics of “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington.” Hollywood dreams of consensus, of happy endings and box office unity, but democratic government can present an interminable tale of gridlock, compromise and division. The squalor and vigor, the glory and corruption of the Republic in action have all too rarely made it onto the big screen. ..... about a president trying to scare up votes to get a bill passed in Congress. .... among the finest films ever made about American politics .... is pleased to present himself as a simple backwoods lawyer, even as his folksy mannerisms mask a formidable and cunning political mind. ..... His Lincoln speaks in a reedy drawl that provides a notable counterpoint to the bombastic bellowing of some of his allies and adversaries. ..... Lincoln is eloquent in the manner of the self-taught provincial prodigy he was, his speech informed by voracious reading and also by the tall tales and dirty jokes he heard growing up in the frontier country of Kentucky and Illinois. He uses words like “shindee” and “flib-flub” and likes to regale (and exasperate) his cabinet with homespun parables, shaggy dog stories and bits of outhouse humor. His salty native wit is complemented by the clear and lofty lyricism that has come down to us in his great speeches. ..... the human particularity and the greatness of a man who is among the most familiar and the most enigmatic of American leaders. We carry him around in our pockets every day, and yet we still argue and wonder about who he was. ...... Lincoln the man is, for all his playfulness, prone to melancholy and attracted to solitude. He has a tender rapport with his young son Tad (Gulliver McGrath), and a difficult relationship with the boy’s older brother, Robert (Joseph Gordon-Levitt), who is furious that his parents have forbidden him to fight for the Union cause. ..... private troubles combine with the strains of a wartime presidency to produce a portrait that is intimate but also decorous, drawn with extraordinary sensitivity and insight and focused, above all, on Lincoln’s character as a politician. ..... a deep, factional split within the Republican Party. .... (spoiler alert for those who slept through high school history) ..... he has to hold his party together and also pick up a handful of votes from lame-duck Democratic congressmen. .... the genius of “Lincoln,” finally, lies in its vision of politics as a noble, sometimes clumsy dialectic of the exalted and the mundane. Our habit of argument, someone said recently, is a mark of our liberty ..... The film places slavery at the center of the story, emphatically countering the revisionist tendency to see some other, more abstract thing — states’ rights, Southern culture, industrial capitalism — as the real cause of the Civil War. ..... a movie about how difficult and costly it has been for the United States to recognize the full and equal humanity of black people. .... D. W. Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation,” which glorified the violent disenfranchisement of African-Americans as a heroic second founding, and “Gone With the Wind,” with its romantic view of the old South. To paraphrase what Woodrow Wilson said of Griffith, Mr. Spielberg writes history with lightning. .... Boredom and confusion are also part of democracy, after all. “Lincoln” is a rough and noble democratic masterpiece — an omen, perhaps, that movies for the people shall not perish from the earth.

The Trouble With Steven Spielberg’s 'Lincoln'
Movie review: Daniel Day-Lewis and Spielberg offer a "Lincoln" both moving and monumental
Movie review: Lincoln film humanizes the legendary president
'Lincoln' review: Daniel Day-Lewis brilliant

It's the voice. The voice is everything. ... History tells us that Abraham Lincoln had a high voice, sometimes described as a silver trumpet, sometimes described as piping, but notably high, enough to be mentioned. And yet the Lincoln of legend, the Lincoln of movies, has been either deep-voiced or Henry Fonda (who was in his own vocal category). Lincoln has been an oracle, and now, in Steven Spielberg's "Lincoln," as portrayed by Daniel Day-Lewis, he is a man..... Suddenly, we see the small-town tale spinner, the backwoods politician, someone who might easily be underestimated. He seems ungainly - not quaintly awkward but raw and slightly foreign to modern eyes. So that when we're reminded that he is, in fact, a political and moral genius, truly one of the great visionaries of history, it's almost a surprise....... This is Lincoln. No need for a time machine, there he is. There are entire stretches in "Lincoln," especially in the Cabinet scenes, as you hear the complexity of his legal and strategic thinking, that you might very well forget you're seeing acting - even forget you're in a movie theater - and instead believe that you're sitting in a room with the 16th president. To be on the receiving end of that is more than entertainment. It feels like a gift..... the intense congressional battle over the 13th Amendment. ..... The Congress of Lincoln is a Congress you might recognize, a body containing a mix of big and shockingly small-minded people, some pushing against the tides of history, some complaining that the president is not ideologically pure enough or committed enough to be trusted....... the more you've read and the more daguerreotypes you've seen, the more you'll appreciate the film's astonishing re-creation of historical tableaux, such as Lincoln's visit to the battlefield or the scene outside the Capitol on the occasion of his second inaugural........ a Lincoln whose patience derives from a lifetime of being smarter than everyone, of knowing that he is 10 steps ahead of even his fastest colleagues. But even Lincoln's patience has limits, and the moment when he reaches it - when he slams his hand down on the desk, asserts his power and insists that he will see his vision made real - is breathtaking. ..... Even better, it really happened.

‘Lincoln’ carries the weight of history
House Divided

Democrats such as Fernando Wood (Lee Pace), a former mayor of New York, who wanted the city to secede from the Union and reap a continuing profit from its cotton trade with the Confederacy ..... The title suggests a monolith, as if going to this movie were tantamount to visiting Mt. Rushmore, and the running time, of two and a half hours, prepares you for an epic. Yet the film is a cramped and ornery affair, with Spielberg going into lockdown mode even more thoroughly than he did in “The Terminal.” As befits a chamber piece, we pass from one chamber to the next: from the crowded floor of the House to the Lincolns’ bedroom, a hospital ward, and the study where Stevens likes to browbeat lesser men. Then, there is the carriage with curtained windows, in which a Southern delegation, led by Alexander Stephens (Jackie Earle Haley), Vice-President of the Confederate States, travels north in secret (and in vain), to discuss a peace deal—peace being the first thing that Lincoln prays for and the last thing he needs right now, before the amendment is passed...... shenanigans in smoke-filled rooms, with most of the smoke emerging from the cigar of Secretary of State William Seward ..... our first sight of Lincoln is from behind, the radiance of his fame being too much to contemplate head on, and we even get a foolish coda, with our hero manifested like an angel through a flickering candle flame, as if the film were unable to leave him be. ....... Resplendent in whiskers and purple waistcoat, Spader enjoys every minute, haring to the White House mid-debate to beg a note from the President, and greeting the great man, as he pays a visit to the enforcers’ hideaway, with the cheery words “Well, I’ll be fucked!” ... Lincoln is undeterred. “I wouldn’t bet against it,” he replies, with a knowing grin....... The voice, too, is pitched a good octave above Fonda’s, yet how swiftly we are lulled into its anecdotal ease. “I heard tell once,” he begins, and the roomful of listeners is hushed in expectation. In a way, that is not far from Ford, although he would not have countenanced the superb moment when Spielberg, eager to crack the spell, has Edwin Stanton (Bruce McGill), the Secretary of War, peel away in exasperation as Lincoln halts a busy night—they are waiting for news, by wire, from the shelling outside Wilmington—to launch into yet another fondly polished tale......... Liam Neeson, a gruffer presence, who for a long while was Spielberg’s choice of leading man ..... the mysterious—and accurate—sense of a man who by instinct and by expertise reaches out to the people he leads while seeming lost in himself. ..... the President’s harshest quarrel is not with her but with his conscience, and with his mortal thoughts ..... Through sickness, infant fatality, and military service, these folk lived more closely with death than we can ever know........ To her, reëlection means “four more years in this terrible house.” ..... a Lincoln film that paid inadequate heed to the forces of rhetoric would be like a porno film that stopped at the bedroom door .... As Tolstoy said of Lincoln, in 1908, “We are still too near to his greatness.” Ain’t that so?

Monday, December 17, 2012

Female Circumcision And Guns That Don't Hunt

My Facebook Post

Not even the staunchest NRA supporter goes hunting with an AK-47. The gun laws in this country are insane.

I have long tried to get into the conservative shoes. Maybe they mean small government. Maybe then mean the state should stay out of your face.

But those who quote the second amendment are no different from those who quote the Bible to justify homophobia, or back in the days justified apartheid, or slavery, it was all in the Bible.

Maybe you needed guns when you first came to this country in the 1700s. But those were lame pre-rifles, they shot deer and, yes, people. But the right to bear machine guns?

If the right to bear arms is so sacrosanct, guns need to be regulated like cars are regulated. I mean, why don't people cruise around on interstate highways in tanks? They perhaps have a right to drive. The right to mobility.

This is really about the money.

I do not want to make light of what happened in Connecticut, but for me gun control is about what the American gun industry is doing to the rest of the world. America exports guns that kill people. American guns start civil wars.

The right to bear arms is about money. Follow the money. That is blood money.

'I Am Adam Lanza's Mother': A Mom's Perspective On The Mental Illness Conversation In America

it’s easy to talk about guns. But it’s time to talk about mental illness..... I live with a son who is mentally ill. I love my son. But he terrifies me. ..... A few weeks ago, Michael pulled a knife and threatened to kill me and then himself after I asked him to return his overdue library books. His 7 and 9 year old siblings knew the safety plan -- they ran to the car and locked the doors before I even asked them to. I managed to get the knife from Michael, then methodically collected all the sharp objects in the house into a single Tupperware container that now travels with me. Through it all, he continued to scream insults at me and threaten to kill or hurt me...... We still don’t know what’s wrong with Michael. .... At the start of seventh grade, Michael was accepted to an accelerated program for highly gifted math and science students. His IQ is off the charts. When he’s in a good mood, he will gladly bend your ear on subjects ranging from Greek mythology to the differences between Einsteinian and Newtonian physics to Doctor Who. He’s in a good mood most of the time. But when he’s not, watch out. And it’s impossible to predict what will set him off. ..... it seems like the United States is using prison as the solution of choice for mentally ill people. ...... our society, with its stigma on mental illness and its broken healthcare system ..... Then another tortured soul shoots up a fast food restaurant. A mall. A kindergarten classroom. And we wring our hands and say, “Something must be done.”

What Does It Mean That Adam Lanza Might Not Have Been Able to Feel Pain?

"If that boy would've burned himself, he would not have known it or felt it physically" ..... congenital insensitivity to pain, a rare neuropathic disorder that makes people unable to register painful stimuli. .... autism spectrum disorders can sometimes correspond with a reduced sensitivity to pain. ..... People with congenital insensitivity mainly experience problems with self-inflicted injuries, but they also sometimes struggle with emotional regulation. ..... a Georgia teenager who can't feel pain. Thirteen-year-old Ashlyn Blocker had been given "a range of psychological tests to determine if she could feel emotional pain and empathy" by her doctor. "He found her to be a bright and friendly child"

It Is Incredible How Much Guns Have Advanced Since The Creation Of The Second Amendment

Understanding where they came from goes a long way to understanding that they're not going away any time soon...... As soon as gunpowder was poured down a metal tube and lit to fire a bullet, the challenge became speeding the process along...... In the history of weapons, the M1 Carbine is the father of what all of we now call "assault weapons." It is also something the writers of the U.S. constitution probably never imagined

A Land Without Guns: How Japan Has Virtually Eliminated Shooting Deaths

America's gun control laws are the loosest in the developed world and its rate of gun-related homicide is the highest. Of the world's 23 "rich" countries, the U.S. gun-related murder rate is almost 20 times that of the other 22. With almost one privately owned firearm per person, America's ownership rate is the highest in the world; tribal-conflict-torn Yemen is ranked second, with a rate about half of America's. ...... the country at the other end of the spectrum .... In 2008, the U.S. had over 12 thousand firearm-related homicides. All of Japan experienced only 11, fewer than were killed at the Aurora shooting alone. And that was a big year: 2006 saw an astounding two, and when that number jumped to 22 in 2007, it became a national scandal. By comparison, also in 2008, 587 Americans were killed just by guns that had discharged accidentally. ........ Even the country's infamous, mafia-like Yakuza tend to forgo guns ..... Japanese tourists who fire off a few rounds at the Royal Hawaiian Shooting Club would be breaking three separate laws back in Japan -- one for holding a handgun, one for possessing unlicensed bullets, and another violation for firing them -- the first of which alone is punishable by one to ten years in jail. ......... Japan is unusual in that potential gun owners must affirmatively prove their mental fitness ...... U.S. gun law has its roots in resistance to British gun restrictions, whereas some academic literature links the Japanese law to the national campaign to forcibly disarm the samurai, which may partially explain why the 1958 mentions firearms and swords side-by-side. ....... Tunisia, which had the lowest firearm ownership rate in the world (one gun per thousand citizens, compared to America's 890) when its people toppled a brutal, 24-year dictatorship and sparked the Arab Spring.

The Freedom of an Armed Society

an armed society — especially as we prosecute it at the moment in this country — is the opposite of a civil society..... gun sales have steadily risen over the past few years, and spiked with each of Obama’s election victories. ..... the N.R.A. strives for a day when the open carry of powerful weapons might be normal, a fixture even, of any visit to the coffee shop or grocery store — or classroom. ....... A favorite gun rights saying is “an armed society is a polite society.” If we allow ever more people to be armed, at any time, in any place, this will provide a powerful deterrent to potential criminals. Or if more citizens were armed — like principals and teachers in the classroom, for example — they could halt senseless shootings ahead of time, or at least early on, and save society a lot of heartache and bloodshed. ...... gun rights advocates famously maintain that individual gun ownership, even of high caliber weapons, is the defining mark of our freedom as such, and the ultimate guarantee of our enduring liberty. Deeper reflection on their argument exposes basic fallacies. ........ speech dominates and distinguishes the polis, the highest form of human association ..... “violence is mute.” ..... Violence — and the threat of it — is a pre-political manner of communication and control, characteristic of undemocratic organizations and hierarchical relationships. ...... Guns do communicate, after all, but in a way that is contrary to free speech aspirations: for, guns chasten speech. ...... An armed society is polite, by their thinking ...... The suggestion is that guns liberally interspersed throughout society would cause us all to walk gingerly — not make any sudden, unexpected moves — and watch what we say, how we act, whom we might offend. ...... The Supreme Court has repeatedly upheld our right to experiment in offensive language and ideas, and in some cases, offensive action and speech. Such experimentation is inherent to our freedom as such. But guns by their nature do not mix with this experiment — they don’t mix with taking offense. They are combustible ingredients in assembly and speech. ....... Such is the effect of guns on speech — and assembly. Like it or not, they transform the bearer, and end the conversation in some fundamental way. They announce that the conversation is not completely unbounded, unfettered and free; there is or can be a limit to negotiation and debate ....... The very power and possibility of free speech and assembly rests on their non-violence. The power of the Occupy Wall Street movement, as well as the Arab Spring protests, stemmed precisely from their non-violent nature. This power was made evident by the ferocity of government response to the Occupy movement. Occupy protestors across the country were increasingly confronted by police in military style garb and affect. ......... The non-violent nature of protest in this country ensures that it can occur. ..... nothing suits power so well as extreme individualism ..... Their pervasive, open presence would sow apprehension, suspicion, mistrust and fear, all emotions that are corrosive of community and civic cooperation. To that extent, then, guns give license to autocratic government. ..... Our gun culture promotes a fatal slide into extreme individualism. It fosters a society of atomistic individuals, isolated before power — and one another — and in the aftermath of shootings such as at Newtown, paralyzed with fear. That is not freedom, but quite its opposite. ...... assembled masses don’t require guns to exercise and secure their freedom, and wield world-changing political force. .... power does not lie in armed individuals, but in assembly

Gun homicides and gun ownership listed by country

With less than 5% of the world's population, the United States is home to roughly 35–50 per cent of the world's civilian-owned guns, heavily skewing the global geography of firearms and any relative comparison ...... The US has the highest gun ownership rate in the world - an average of 88 per 100 people. That puts it first in the world for gun ownership - and even the number two country, Yemen, has significantly fewer - 54.8 per 100 people ...... But the US does not have the worst firearm murder rate - that prize belongs to Honduras, El Salvador and Jamaica. ....... Puerto Rico tops the world's table for firearms murders as a percentage of all homicides - 94.8%. It's followed by Sierra Leone in Africa and Saint Kitts and Nevis in the Caribbean

Manchin Gives Boost to Gun-Restrictions Push

even strong proponents of gun rights in Congress may begin to shift in their views after the deadly shooting rampage last week in Newtown

GUNS AND THE LIMITS OF SHAME

When did a majority of South African Boers realize that Apartheid was reprehensible? How about whites in the American South? When will the Japanese force their whalers to stop, finally realizing that their persistence has caused widespread international revulsion and opprobrium? When will the British realize that public drunkenness—a practice now internationally associated with them as a nation—is something to be embarrassed about? When will we Americans realize that our society is an unacceptably violent one, that this is how the rest of the world sees us, and that much of that violence is associated with guns? Will it be the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School? Where is our threshold for self-awareness? ...... The unprecedented massacre of children led, within two years, to legislation that imposed a total ban on the private ownership of handguns in the United Kingdom. Today, no one in the United Kingdom can privately own a handgun or a semiautomatic weapon....... There was not much hand wringing or heated debate over this legislation. It was discussed, and enacted, with overwhelming public support, in response to the mood of national shame and grief over the killings. ...... What will it require for a majority of Americans to realize that they have a national problem that needs to be urgently addressed? We have lost four Presidents to gunmen in our short history as a nation, and very nearly lost several more ..... Would even another, much larger school massacre bring about change? .... If someone murdered a hundred schoolchildren in a single day with guns, would a majority of Americans agree to true restrictions on them? What is our national threshold for shame?

Mayor Bloomberg Telling It As It Is on Gun Control

The U.S. gun laws, bought and paid for by the N.R.A., are a disgrace to the nation, an affront to the values it claims to represent, and a travesty of the Democratic process. ...... Senator Dianne Feinstein, of California, said that once Congress resumes she would introduce a bill to ban on assault weapons. (The previous ban expired in 2004.) And Dan Malloy, the governor of Connecticut, seconded the call for such a ban ...... And if he does nothing during his second term, something like forty-eight thousand Americans will be killed with illegal guns. That is roughly the number of Americans killed in the whole of the Vietnam War....... prohibit assault weapons. We’ve got to really question whether military-style weapons with big magazines belong in the streets of America in this day and age. Nobody questions the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. But I don’t think the founding fathers had the idea that every man, woman, and child could carry an assault weapon..... nobody should underestimate the hatred, ignorance, baloney, mendacity, and borderline lunacy that would confront him if he were to follow Bloomberg’s advice and take on the gun lobby ....... There is no point trying to reason with Republican gun nuts like Gohmert, just as there is no point trying to reason with Republican anti-tax nuts about income-tax rates, or with Republican nativists about immigration.

WHAT OBAMA MUST DO ABOUT GUNS

emotion is hardly all that is needed. What is needed is gun control—strict, comprehensive gun control that places the values of public safety and security before the values of deer hunting and a perverse ahistorical reading of the Second Amendment. ...... in my home town of Chicago, there’s an awful lot of violence and they’re not using AK-47s. They’re using cheap hand guns..... eleven of the worst twenty mass shootings in the past half century have taken place in the U.S.