Mixed Reviews
By Michael R. Bowen (07/14/03)
Plenty of fodder in the news lately, folks.
Flying the Flag...
In Ashland, Oregon this week, a student at the publicly-funded Willow Wind Community Learning Center asked the facility to fly the American flag. For Americans of normal intellect this is not a difficult request, besides which the state law requires the flag to be flown at public school buildings. But then, you and I are probably not members of the National Education Association (NEA). School superintendent Juli DiChiro was puzzled. "The question is, is the emphasis on school or on building?" She asked. School Director Debi Pew (what happened to the letter 'e' at that school, anyway?) also had difficulty understanding the law and told a student that the flag might offend some students. Chiming in, Tracy Bungay opined, "I want to raise my children to be citizens of the world, and the flag does not represent ideas I want to instill. It represents dominance, greed, corporate power, and not freedom. I think it even represents commercialism and consumerism." All three of these fools need to be reminded that Delta has flights every day departing for more enlightened countries. Perhaps they'd like to go to Liberia, and save us from risking three good Marines. Anyone want to take up a collection to buy tickets?
Truth in Labeling...
More proof that the East Coast is higher than the West Coast, causing all the nuts to roll to the West: one Kumar Venkat in Cupertino, California warns us not to be deceived by labels boasting that the product was made with recycled materials or produced in some other organic feel-good way. In the Christian Science Monitor this week, Venkat warns us that there are all sorts of hidden costs in this "socially responsible" shopping. Certain organic products must be brought in from far away, thereby increasing energy consumption. An oh-so-responsible laundry detergent, made without those horrible petroleum products, is hideously blemished by being packaged in a petroleum-based plastic bottle, and we learn to our horror that it also probably had to be shipped from somewhere. Yes, friends, lurking under that reassuring organically grown--fair trade--recycled material--not tested on baby rabbits label is a festering stew of hidden ecological crimes. Who knew? But not to worry: Venkat has a solution, and you'll never guess what it is, so I'll tell you. The "silence of industrial-aged foods and manufactured goods must be broken" by requiring manufacturers and food producers to disclose on the label "the average amount of energy (renewable and nonrenewable) spent in creating and delivering a product, including energy used to produce its ingredients or components. This estimate should include all the processing and transportation-from extraction of minerals to finished goods-as well as energy needed for recycling or disposal at the end of the product's life."
It gets better. "A second useful figure would be the quantity of materials, such as paper, plastic, glass, and metal, used in manufacturing a product and which of them are recyclable. ... A final figure would be an estimate of the average distance traveled by the product, similar to the average energy consumed. Smaller energy and materials figures would indicate greater resource efficiency and smaller distance figures would reflect greater local content in a product."
Now why I didn't I think of that? Come to think of it, maybe newspaper articles from California should have truth in labeling, such as information on how many hits on the bong were taken by the author before sitting down at the keyboard. Reasonable estimates of the distance the author has traveled from reality to his present location, and what means of travel he employed, might also be helpful. Meanwhile, Venkat could really strike a blow for the environment right at home by reusing toilet paper instead of just throwing it away after one use.
Diversity...
Well, Sandra Day O'Connor says we all need diversity now. This pet concept of the Democratic Left (for them, it replaces the Constitution) was recently put to the test. A Pro-Life group, Democrats for Life, asked that their website be given a link on the website of the Democratic National Committee. The DNC offers links to sites quite unconnected with the Democratic Party, such as the Air Force, Army, Navy, and Marine Corps, and even more tangential sites such as the Armenian National Committee and the National Italian American Foundation. There are no less than 7 pro-abortion links listed there. They even let Catholics be Democrats: there's a link to Catholics For A Free Choice. But when Kristin Day from Democrats for Life requested a link, it was nothing doing. Guess that's not the kind of diversity the Democrats have in mind.
Untruth in Movie-land...
Disney and Miramax are preparing to release their latest blockbuster, "Buffalo Soldiers", portraying Army life as a matter of theft, drug abuse, corruption, violence, and promiscuity. Star Joaquin Phoenix (brother of, as P.J. O'Rourke would say, River, Leaf, Stump, and Ditch) is amazed that anyone objects. "I don't know why anyone would be offended. It wasn't a movie that was intended to offend. And if we don't show things as they really happen, and what's that about? Censorship!" Mr. Phoenix may be the only member of his family with a human name, but clearly the Dumb Gene is in the family DNA. If Joaquin wants to understand censorship, he might check with the DNC.
Meeting Victor Hugo...
Lampooning the lunacy of the Left is like shooting fish in a barrel. Not that the Republicans, or, rather, those people who play Republicans in Washington, are any more solid. Watching what passes for Republicans these days, I'm reminded of the gentleman who had once met Victor Hugo. Asked what it had been like, he said "it was like meeting a madman who thought he was Victor Hugo."
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