Incensed and Enthused

Actually, while temporarily here in the ranks of the unemployed, there are three future-focused endeavors I've been pursuing, though with <guilty blush> varying degrees of active pursuit:

1) Re-employment, but closer to home than my most recent employer;

2) Return to college and get a) associate's degree, b) master's degree, c) etc.; and

3) Find the next steps required toward the priesthood or/and professed-religious life.

This week I must have fired off another dozen résumés, as well as hobnobbed and networked at a bustling job fair. I also paid a courtesy-call on the Provincial House of the religious (women's) order where I'd applied for an open executive-assistant position early last week. The friendly, upbeat receptionist there – incredibly, she remembered me! – checked, and confirmed that only now is the placement-person beginning to review the applications… and she visibly and verbally crossed her fingers for me!

And: where would we Catholic men be without our mothers? My own's been urging me to not neglect Items 2) and 3) above, especially given that many centers of higher education are heavily plugged into their surrounding communities, and have networks of their own in-the-know job-placement folks.

Since I had reason to be in that stretch of Maryland just down the road from Pennsylvania, this afternoon I dropped in on Mount St. Mary's University in tiny Emmitsburg, Maryland (home also of the National Firefighters' Memorial, by the way… and of an ex-girlfriend, come to think of it, one best referred to as Mrs. Robinson, should I mention her here again).

Clueless as to where most of anything is on campus, I popped in at the Student Information Center, and was patiently steered toward the buildings (Admissions, and Seminary) and online resources, where I could take on all three of the above pursuits.

Seminary!

Even before the Admissions building, I had to get to the Seminary, find some kind of office and get some info on the admissions – specifically, to this seminary itself, and in general as a late vocation to various seminaries and avowed religious orders.

Up the steps – and even before I was through the thick wooden doors, I saw a smoky chapel straight ahead, and my pulse doubled instantly. The smoke, of course, was incense, nearly thick enough to swim through, which I did. A priest was just finishing a Eucharistic exposition/adoration, and I did manage a glimpse of Jesus Himself (yes) as the Blessed Sacrament was removed from the monstrance and put in the tabernacle.

(I'll explain these later for you Protestants… and for many of you Catholics, too; shame on you! For now, all of you go back to John 6:28-68 and read Jesus' words. If we take them literally – and every indication is that this is exactly how Jesus meant them – then the Holy Eucharist is Jesus physically present among us, period. Or he was lying. You wanna call Jesus a liar?)

In attendance there were a dozen or more seminarians – to the untrained eye (including my own), looking like priests in their black-and-whites; among their number as they left was a Franciscan friar I recognized from the Missionaries of the Eternal Word, as seen on EWTN. (Mt. St. Mary's Seminary is their seminary.) As my pulse doubled again, we traded hellos, and he went on down the hall.

I stopped one of the last seminarians leaving, asking him whom I should see, or where I should go, regarding admissions and vocations; he guided me to another seminarian. For a moment I found I had been politely led into the office of the Monsignor himself, His Eminence (I’m not sure if that's the correct mode of address) Steven P. Rohlfs, rector and vice-president.

This was for all of five seconds… which was good, since I would have fainted at seven. His executive assistant ran a gentle, cheerful, and competent interference, and led me into another office or two. She asked patient questions, and gave me the seminary's course catalog, a listing of further resources online (as well as email addresses) specific to my archdiocese, and some further suggestions. As my heartbeat at last approached near-normal (although I was now breaking out in a sweat of mixed enthusiasm, wow, and serious yikes), she also let me know that there'd be a mass at four (it was now a bit after three-thirty) at the Chapel of the Immaculate Conception, on campus.

This was halfway between the Seminary and the University's Administration building… and I never made it as far as Administration; that'll be Monday's trip: once in the Chapel, I remained. I had a little time for prayer and meditation, amid the seminarians there, and further ones joining us seated and kneeling (believe me, I was on my knees).

Then the priests came in, dressed in red robes in honor of the martyrdom of St. Matthew (gospel-writer, Apostle, and entrenched sinner like the rest of us), whose feast day is today. There were eleven priests, probably twice as many altar servers (adult men, not altar boys/girls), and dozens of seminarians filling the old, straight-backed pews. I even got to chant with them in Greek! Incense was once again being wafted about, and I found myself thinking, "Ohhh, I am so out of my league here…"; I absolutely loved it.

As to being out of my league… well, the priest doing the homily – quoting his mother (as well he should) – pointed out that God doesn't call the qualified, He qualifies the called. There's my consolation. I strongly believe I am indeed called into the religious life – by which I mean professed/avowed religious (monk/friar/brother), and not simply living religiously. This is not for any worth on my part or in my nature, but simply because, for whatever reason, there is something (small that it may be) that I can give the Church, and to the world.

Nothing captivates my mind and heart (and pulse) like the faith, and all things Catholica – not a lovely woman, not a box of unsorted nineteenth-century stamps, not even a one-way, first-class ticket to the country of my choice, with language lessons and native-born, English-fluent tutor thrown in at no extra charge.

I know this bores some folks to tears, but for me it is just absolutely thrilling. Most amazing today is that I didn't leave the Chapel doing a Cupertino. Well, there's always Monday.

 

Followup: Blue Dog left a warm (and unexpected) comment:

Blue Dog Sep 21, 2007

Wonderful, uplifting post. My prayers are with you and I suspect you will be surprised when you finally learn where God in his wisdom ends up placing you. I know I usually am … surprised that is.

Pain in the Compass

Okay, Blue Dog's already checked back in: he's not going to give the Political Compass another spin. I'm disappointed a bit, though I suspected (hoping differently) he'd so answer, that he was uninterested in approaching anew that site's series of social-political statements. I was also afraid I might have ruffled that dog's feathers a bit, but that's not the case. Let's put him back on the soapbox – c'mon, boy; up!

Perhaps you misunderstand my answers. I see no second set of answers possible in responding to these questions.

Let us look at [Republican] Ron Paul (not my candidate by the way, just an example). He is utterly opposes abortion. Nevertheless, he also takes the position that as a matter of the United States Constitution, abortion as a matter of law is a non-federal issue left to the states. If you examine Ron Paul's stated positions, I expect that you will find he falls much further toward the libertarian side of the graph than is reflected by his actual placed position among the 2008 Presidential candidates.

Now if you ask me whether abortion, when the woman's life is not threatened, should always be illegal, I say yes. I see no other possible answer given my belief that human life is sacred and that a fetus is a human life. This statement may simplify my position, but after struggling with the issue, I see no other possible response.

(I told Dog in my response to this email that I intend to address this specific issue, and how I as a very liberal, feminist male – yet fully obedient, submissive son of the Church – come down. Likely I'll do so in January… though I may just jump in sooner.)

As another example, your own position places you quite near Gandhi. But ask yourself if someone were to examine your life, would they place you next to Gandhi on the chart. And I do not ask this question in an attempt to question your answers to the questions or the way you live your life.

Dog, my friend, the tool/test does not attempt to graphically place people by overall lifestyle. Rather, it's a look at the person's placement strictly along their social/political/economic outlook. Spiritual-practice-wise, I'd fall more closely to Pope Benedict than to Mahatma-ji. But if we each filled out political ballots (yes, I'd let him go first), I doubt we'd vote in the same slate of candidates.

Now, let us look at your friend Spartacus. He's as socially aware as Gandhi and deep into anarchist territory. I have no problem with his answers. I do not challenge the sincerity of his response. But if the person who put together this test wanted to place him on the chart without first having him take the test, how would this person accomplish that task?

Does Spartacus have a job? Does he pay his taxes? Does he obey most traffic laws? Is he married? Does he support his children? How much does he give away to charities? Has he accumulated any wealth? Does he live the life of an ascetic?

What I am saying is this test judges the world leaders by outside, objective standards. How does Hillary Clinton vote in the Senate? Then it judges us by how we answer the questions on this test.

Of course the big figures in their results-matrix did not take the test themselves, so the authors had to do some conjecture… but are not doing this placement uneducatedly. As they explain on the result-page, "A diverse professional team has assessed the words and actions of internationally known contemporary leaders to give you an idea of how they relate to each other on the political compass." Again, this is political placement, not overall lifestyle; this is political analysis. Oh, well; say on.

Do any of us really live the life of Gandhi? To be honest, I suspect that you may be closer than I to Gandhi. [Gee, thanks, Blue – but you've never seen me in a dhoti.] And I don't know Spartacus well enough to judge. But I know that I have not devoted my life to the poor. I'm your basic businessman who is raising two children, hitting church on Sundays, going to California Coastal Cleanup Day tomorrow with a bunch from my church, working a carwash later in the day for the Church Middle School Group, meeting a young man tomorrow to talk about his future, the kind of mundane, routine things we all do in this life. I give what I can, do what I can, but I definitely do not make the sort of choices in life that would have a neutral third-party put me next to the Dalai Lama or Gandhi after examining my life.

On another note, I suspect most Democratic candidates actually, as they have stated, bitterly oppose to the war. Yet time and again they have voted to fund the war. If a anti-war individual took this test, their answers would reflect their anti-war values. But we would judge Hillary Clinton, etc., on their votes? Or would we judge them on their stated position?

Good point.

What I think is much more interesting is where they place the parties. We see a much deeper spread. For example, the UK Green party cuddles up to Dalai Lama territory. Why? They place the parties on the scale based on their written, articulated positions.

Now, let us examine George W. Bush. With respect to the removal of life support from patients in a persistent vegetative state, his stated position is strongly opposed (and presumably this would track his test answers). But in 1999, he signed Texas legislation permitting doctors to remove life support from such patients regardless of the wishes of the family. Do we go by the stated position of George W. Bush (as we do with our own answers) or do we judge George W. Bush by his actions?

If we look at the historical record, how many figures do we actually find in the Libertarian/Left Quadrant? We find Dalai Llama, Gandhi, (Christ, I suspect, though they do not place him), and Nelson Mandela.

If we asked Nelson Mandela where he stood on economic globalization, I suspect he would favor people over corporations. But when he talks about blood diamonds in the context of that recent film and says, "...it would be deeply regrettable if the making of the film inadvertently obscured the truth, and, as a result, led the world to believe that an appropriate response might be to cease buying mined diamonds from Africa.... We hope that the desire to tell a gripping and important real life historical story will not result in the destabilization of African diamond producing countries, and ultimately their peoples." If we argue that his statement is because lost revenue hurts the diamond mine economy, can we not make that argument in every instance?

In the end, it is an interesting test. But I don't have the same level of faith in it. I need to see if I can find some old threads on it. As I recall, pretty much everyone taking the test ends up at one extreme or another.

No, I didn't end up at any kind of extreme. Given the layout of their matrix, I think "extreme" would be any individual at the far end, left/right or up/down, one of the axes: i.e., not embracing anything beyond a total authoritarian/anarchistic social focus, or/and a total left/right economic focus. These individuals are rare even among demagogs, I'll bet.

The matrix shows that Pope Benedict and I fall differently in terms of authoritarianism – but it's Stalin who's at a far end of the matrix; and overall His Holiness is placed more closely to the middle than I am, in fact; not a surprise to me. And everybody's favorite acephalic chimpanzee, George II, is at an extreme… but at Stalin's opposite? Well, okay; for Uncle Joe the State was supreme, whereas W seems to favor a smaller state… thereby corporations run free, wild, and unhindered.

I responded to Blue Dog, with hopes he and his own people will have at the concept further at his own blog; they a lot more capable and experienced:

Well… I misunderstood your explanation of how you approached the questions/statements. Though your skepticism runs strongly on Political Compass's tool, could you consider maybe dropping it in on one of your own bloggings, and see how your own readers (far more of them than mine, and a good deal less flaky [pardon me there, Spartacus], in all likelihood) fare with the questions, both in how the results paint them, and how they feel about it?

If you take up the topic (and I think it would be a shame if you don't), do please not hold back on expressing your feelings on its accuracy and usefulness, short of preprogramming your keen masses out there in advance of their trying it out themselves.

You're quite free, of course, to quote or reference Empty Tomb in any way you might need – though I doubt it would raise the level of dialog on Blue Dog Thoughts! While I'm muttering to myself in a corner, you're sitting at a long, well-lit table, with organized stations of notepads, water pitchers, and attentive attendees, and dressed in a smart suit and speaking clearly and resonantly. There are no Frisbees.

Likely, as with all tools, this one's not for every mechanic. I can put impressive holes in the drywall with a good drop-forged steel chisel, the next person will carve out a "David", and the next yet will use it to mug a passing grandmother, and yet another lay it on the desk as a paperweight.

Regards,

AgingChild

We'll see how the Compass fares there; ditto, I'll have Mouse's take, when and if. Now, back to Pius.

Spinning the Compass

Spartacus gave me his permission to post/paste up here his comments on the Political Compass website's easy online tool, which has been designed to gauge a person's political locus more accurately than by the inadequate, centuries-old left/right paradigm. While Blue Dog's check-marking a fresh answer-sheet (never any need to erase here!), let's go on with the Compass tool.

I mentioned in the initial blog of this current cascade that I was going to ask charming (and frustrating) conservative-lass Anon E. Mouse to give that tool a shot. I did get a note off to her late yesterday; no response yet, of course, but I'll add her results here as well – and if we hit the jackpot (her husband and their friend F3), they're all getting a place of honor: I really want folks from the traditional "right" to try the tool and join in here.

Actually, since Blue Dog's got the readership (while I've got the sunken ship), it's likelier this will play out much more thoroughly and extensively on his blog, with a nice array of testers from all along the spectrum – er, compass.

The concept of going from a monodimensional spectrum to a bidimensional, arguably more-accurate, graphic placement of individuals politically, will both shake things up and boost the better areas of the transpolitical dialog… if it catches on; I hope it does.

Once I myself had run (or rather, walked) through the statements posed to the users of the Political Compass tool, I let Spartacus know, since – across several state lines – I could hear him shifting from foot to foot, waiting to bring in his perspective on his results, and where they led him. I included for him a screencap of where I placed on the diagram (I’m not as fond of the "compass" word here, myself – more on that in a bit).

Folks, bear in mind the following is one person's own results, and his views and springboardings therefrom; your own mileage will likely vary a good deal. They do give some insight specifically on this particular Empty Tomb reader; they do not give insight to you. End of caveat.

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, September 12, 2007 11:09 PM

Yep, had no problem whatever reading the file you attached. Thanks too for attaching your graph, though unfortunately I can't reciprocate--I didn't save mine :-(

I did however, write down my numbers and it should be easy enough to extrapolate where they fit in.

My numbers are -6.63 on the Left/Right axis, and -6.31 on the Authoritarian/Libertarian axis. That lands me comfortably in anarchist territory, and that suits me just fine--I have no faith whatsoever that our present political system is capable of enacting the real change needed to honestly address the ills of this world. Dems/Reps, they're all basically the same, all part of the dog and pony show which helps maintain the illusion of political freedom and keeps people diverted from understanding what is really in their best interest.

 (He and I have batted this viewpoint around before.)

Further reading on the Political Compass site steered me toward looking into anarcho-syndicalism (a dimly forgotten term from a half remembered college poli-sci course). I've since Googled and surfed a number of anarcho-syndicalist sites--yes, it's a philosophy I can really get behind (I'm sewing up a red/black diagonal anarcho-syndicalist flag even as I type--LOL!).

Here are links to some of the sites if you're interested:

http://www.anarchosyndicalism.net/

http://flag.blackened.net/rocker/index.html

I too was relieved to find myself in Gandhi's and the Dalai Lama's neighborhood--some of those other neighborhoods are SCARY, not the sort of places you want to be in after dark!

Taking the Political Compass quiz has also helped trigger thoughts about how my political philosophy has developed over time. I used to characterize myself as a Libertarian, but then grew gradually more uncomfortable as I began to realize the right wing implications of Libertarianism (at least as it is perceived in the USA--elsewhere it apparently has a more leftward tilt), so it was really quite interesting to see by my numbers how the strong libertarian feeling is tempered by an equally strong left orientation.

When I was in college and grad school in my 20's, I had a strong aversion to the leftist bias of my professors. Even though I lapped up courses such as history of socialism, (and indeed, my virtual, unofficial "minor" was utopian socialist philosophers and communes of the 19th century), I suspect that strong libertarian streak clouded my judgment about what was really being said. I just couldn't differentiate between the liberal socialism (anarchism) I find so instinctively appealing, and the sad authoritarian "socialism" of the Bolsheviks, Communists, et al. Then again, I'm also going to lay some of the blame at my professors' feet--in retrospect they really didn't do such a good job of making those differences clear (probably the effect of years of student apathy if not outright hostility--the '80s were light-years from the '60s!!).

Mentioning utopian socialist communes above also brought to mind something else I've been interested in for a long time--monasticism (for it's social, not religious, aspects). I think I told you before how I asked my medieval history professor into lending me the key to the library's rare books room so I could pore over "The Plan of St. Gall", an oversized tome describing an ideal monastic community of the Carolingian age (IIRC). Communal living fascinates me. IMHO, it is the natural way for humans to live, and one of the reasons for humanity's ills is that we live apart--there is too much emphasis on the myth of individualism. Human beings were never historically expected to cope on their lonesome as they do today--only recently have we lost that real and vital aspect of true community. Though only the most paranoid would say it's been deliberate (I am tempted though!), isn't it interesting how our present political system has benefitted from keeping people socially isolated--divide and conquer!!!

Junior Proudhon

A particular term there rang a bell in my memory-banks as clear as a call to one of Pavlov's dogs:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Thursday, September 13, 2007 2:45 PM
Subject: RE: Bloody Peasant!

Thank you for the anarcho-syndicalist information; it's interesting enough that I definitely want to dig into that some more myself. But I almost choked on my lunch at your mention of the term. I've been familiar with it since the mid-seventies, owing to a scene from "Monty Python and the Holy Grail":

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAaWvVFERVA

Take a moment and watch that, and enjoy. Essentially, you are the peasant Dennis here (the actor is Michael Palin – you may recall him as the stuttering fellow in "A Fish Called Wanda"); here King Arthur and his groom Patsy are seeking regional lords (they're riding their coconut mock-horses… never mind) to aid in his quest to find the Holy Grail.

My brothers actually aimed me at the move in my teen years, and shoved hard; so I'll bounce the links – likely today's blog, too – back at them for further reaction.

I agree with you on the odd turns organized libertarianism has made here in the US – certain of the concepts are great (even Patrick Henry would approve some of 'em, methinks), but I just look over Larouche and … <shudder>.

I'm actually not as much in step with you on the social concept of monasticism/communalism. (Though for me my personal move into that realm would be part of a spiritual progression, of course.) My own feel is that there are enough self-focused people among the general rabble who simply aren't constituted for that kind of community: either they'd lash out, or plunder, or seize control. I.e., "more equal than others". Some are already in such communities, too… which makes it all that more exciting. <yawns and grits teeth simultaneously>

More thought required here, of course!

That video seems to have gotten Sparklers chuckling while pulling up the drawbridge and dropping more gators in the moat:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Friday, September 14, 2007 4:59 PM

I got a private chuckle from the YouTube link you sent--not just for the humor involved, but also because when I Googled "anarcho-syndicalism", one of the "hits" I received was to a transcription of that very same "Holy Grail" scene. Little did those guys realize that years after the movie, websurfers seeking info on certain liberal-socialist philosophies would be sucked into the Python demiverse.

>"I'm also going to pass that site's link to Mouse and ask her to answer the questions and let me know how the testing scores her (again, no rights or wrongs – or lefts – there) and add the info (with discretion and permission), as well as Blue Dog's if we can get him to scratch our itch on it. I'm also hoping Mouse will get her husband and some of their cronies to give it a shot, and get back with me… might contact at least one of them directly myself."

I think that's a great idea--be sure to stress when you're making the pitch that it is a non-partisan quiz, that it is just a tool.

> "I'm actually not as much in step with you on the social concept of monasticism/communalism...My own feel is that there are enough self-focused people among the general rabble who simply aren't constituted for that kind of community..."

Well, I certainly wasn't suggesting something like that be compulsory! I was thinking more in terms of the "village" in the "old country", where people lived together in extended families, and, more often than not, also worked together toward common goals. My grandfather used to tell stories about how it was growing up in a village in Sicily--pretty much everyone was related to everyone else in one way or another, and they would work the fields together as a village. During harvest time the men would work in the fields while the women were back in the village cooking the midday meal, which they would then bring out to the men and everyone would eat together and then take a siesta during the heat of the day--they shared the labor, they shared the responsibilities, they shared the fruit of their labors. No woman was left alone during the day to take care of her baby all by herself--there was an extended network of aunts uncles cousins, bros, sisters, etc to help. If someone got sick, injured, died, it wasn't a dire bow to the family's well being, because the family didn't exist in a virtual vacuum as do so many families today.

Personally, I am someone who appreciates his privacy, but I have to admit, living here in relative isolation, that I wouldn't mind being in a community of like minded people working toward some common goal. I suppose that's one reason I have so much respect/admiration for the Amish.

I think life amid the Amish would indeed be a paradise of sorts for ol' Spartacus, someday. I could pop in occasionally in robe and tonsure and coach him through his archaic German, and maybe also sneak in a bit of Latin and Old Church Slavonic while he's not looking, just to confuse things a bit. Piēs Jēsu Dōmīnē…

He does have a point there, on a social concept of humanity reworked as (or reverted to) a network of small communities of extended families, communal-like villages. We could do well to lose the iPods and drive-by shootings… but if we're also going to be capable still of transcontinental flight, some kind of Internet, and cutting-edge medicine – let alone adequate distribution of food and resources to the world's masses – then we can't toss out the infrastructure. We'll still need power, transportation… brother.

Ah; another, later topic – not to mention taking a longer look at the whole realm of a spiritual monastic community. Let's get back with the Political Compass for now, though. I'm hoping Blue can try the tool again, likewise a range of his readers, and also Ms. Mouse. If they don't have a chance to come by and visit in the next couple days, I'll get back on redeeming His Holiness.

But the reason I said, above, that I'm wary of using the term "compass" to describe placement of a point on an x/y graph is that "compass" embraces the idea of a direction-finder, and movement. Yet each person's placement on that grid is static – no tangents, or trés-cool sinusoidal waves, even, let alone an arrow locking on the magnetic north/south. I don’t think the tool functions as a "compass" at all, other than to suggest "You Are Here" in your political outlook, and that these people of particular impact through sociopolitical history are your neighbors.

Just unimportant semantic fussiness on my part; Blue Dog and Bark-a-Cuss are the big political hounds around here, and know a good deal more about these things than this mere Aging Child does. As do, especially, the developers of that Political Compass in the first place!

Good night for now.

The Blue Compass, Take ONE

I heard back from Blue Dog ahead of Spartacus on yesterday's blog:

Subject: Re: A Whole New Dimension

Very interesting. I think one reason the 2007 Candidates all cluster in [one particular area of the chart/compass] is that we judge them by where they are in terms of their votes. While we take the test in terms of our ideals.

Thus, I answered in terms of what I would like society to be, [and Dog gives some examples], etc. But in analyzing what is right for our government, I analyze in terms of what is right given the system of government that we live in.

In other words, I'm not sure how actually useful that test is. Am I really more liberal than [name] and more libertarian than [another name]? Nonsense, if you gave this test to each of those individuals their results would be much different than where these individuals are placed based on their positions.

Let me put it this way, I'm fairly sure that Hitler viewed himself as a moderate. And that [second name] would test out as libertarian as possible if he answered the questions.

We answer the test based on what we feel is the right, the ideal. Then the world judges us on what we do.

On another note, go take the test http://www.politichoice.com. You have to register, but if gives out very interesting information afterward.

Blue Dog

With all due respect sir, and having assured both my infrequent readers quite clearly yesterday that "[t]here are no right or wrong answers" – echoing the authors – I'm sending you back to the other classroom for a couple minutes to retake this test, and return here with your fresh results.

No, your answers (and thus the results) weren't wrong – but inaccurate in their intended design of providing you (quoting the Political Compass website) "a better idea of where [you] stand politically - and the sort of political company [you] keep". Rather than "answer[ing] the test based on what [you] feel is the right, the ideal", let me suggest you give the questions a second shot now, and "choose the response that best describes your feeling" [emphasis mine], and not look for an ideal-world set of answers, not "take the test in terms of [y]our ideals".

You're absolutely right that answering in the fashion you did scuttles the usefulness of the test in actually snapshotting you politically. Your original method, and thus those first-go results, would no doubt describe the world (or/and Blue Dog in it) as it ought to be for you. Now, how about re-answering by instead giving each statement/question a "response that best describes your feeling" (as the authors appear to have had in mind), and in such a way that your check-marks aren't rose colored.

Again, Mr. Blue, I ask this with no disrespect or disappointment whatsoever! I'm really curious to have your read on how much more true-to-life a set of fresh results would paint you. But – and thanks – I do want to also tackle here what the tool/concept might suggest an ideal world would be like (heavy subjectivity here!) as you see it, using that original method of yours. First, though, I'm going to put up Spartacus's paint-by-number portrait, as his responses drew and oiled it. Stand by, gents!

(Sparky, you're welcome to weigh in here anytime; you know more about that Compass than I do.)

 

From Spectrum to Compass

Some of my postings here may leave doubts in readers' minds that I'm a peaceful man, preferring to focus my heart and head around issues of spirit, and matters of family, language, history, and so on. Certainly in this forum I've collected plenty of splinters on the soles of my feet from leaping quickly onto the sturdy soapbox and pulling your eyes and attention to yet another outrage from the right, or The Right.

But I do favor peace – wholesale, and retail – in dealing with other folks. I resort to potshots only when I feel attention, a voice, is needed. (E.g., our emperor has been strutting for years sans culottes, and it is both my right and duty to point this out. I do not delight in the sight.)

In one of my blog-postings a couple days ago, I made mention (not for the first time) that friend and occasional contributor Spartacus "politically is farther to the left of me". With years in the USAF solidly behind him (and having shaped him), with wife and progeny and animals and model airplanes and workshop and poison-ivy patch out back, I do forget that Sparks also has a solid grounding in politics, and he bristles at the simplistic ignorance behind those "left"/"right" and "blue"/"red" labels.

While aware that the concept of a straight-line spectrum spanning from infradig to ultraviolent is inadequate to embrace the range of lemons that come rolling out underfoot each time someone in the world pulls the lever in a polling booth (or hoists or burns a new flag), I have still been rather automatically seeing things more monodimensionally than is the case in real sociopolitical world, even just right here in the States – let alone the odder mélange (again, to my eyes) that the rest of the world serves up.

Sparty called my attention to this deficiency of mine yesterday via an email:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Wednesday, September 12, 2007 11:33 AM

Hey Guy!

Re the latest political screed — you really need to take 10 minutes out of your schedule to take this quiz:

http://www.politicalcompass.org/index

It's a better way of looking at where you are politically — instead of just dealing with the old left/right political spectrum, it also helps quantify the authoritarian/libertarian scale of values — hence the "political compass" rather than just "political spectrum".

The test is easy and fun. It only takes about 10 minutes. You do not have to register for it or supply an e-mail — you are completely anonymous. They won't try to sell you anything, and participating does not result in any spam. The results may surprise you — I wasn't really surprised, but my results did give me ideas for further reading which I may not have thought of on my own. I have followed up on some of that suggested reading and it has been quite rewarding in helping me to refine my personal political philosophy.

If you do decide to go there, please take the test before reading over the rest of the site — prior reading could unconsciously bias your answers.

I urge you to do it — and pass it along to your other correspondents. Put the URL up on your blog — it's such a wonderfully useful little tool.

I've been sitting on my results for weeks now — I'm just dying to talk them over with you (and vice versa).

OK, I'll step down from the soapbox now.

Have a great day!!!!

Rab L. Rouser

That seemed rather interesting… so of course I went over to the site to give it a go. And it was fun. Thanks, Sparta!

Having reviewed that site, and tested there, I must say I find it darned interesting and revealing indeed. To that simple straight-line, bar-spectrum view of sinister/dexter politicians, the folks at Political Compass have added a whole new dimension.

Politically, people of course sway more this way or that in terms of social issues and economics. So… they've broken these out as separate spectra, x and y axes against which one can place individual points (and pointed individuals) based on where they fall between four extremes, not two. (I’m sure you remember this kind of layout from high-school math classes.) Fascinating! Authoritarian versus anarchistic, collectivism versus small-L libertarianism – what a concept!

I can't say more here, since it could skew how you test out – but I, too, urge each of you to head over to that site, read their preface on this far more realistic concept, and go ahead and take the test. You'll simply mark the level of your agreement/disagreement in response to a series of "propositions", or statements of… well, I guess you could say social, political, and economic opinions/concepts.

Specifically – not to put you on the spot, sir – I'm looking at you, Blue Dog (among others, too), to give this one a go. I think it would serve as a great springboard at your own blog, which sees exponentially more readers than this little corner of the 'net does. I'd also like your reaction, Blue (just email me, or just leave a reply/comment below), on that site's concept in general, what the testing says about you, and how adequate/accurate you feel this is (and why). I'll only post up here what you okay in advance, of course.

I'll also fire off a note to our Anon E. Mouse to do the same, asking her as well to reel in her husband long enough to get him to test there at Political Compass, and ditto their friend F3, with whom I had such a delightful online tussle a few months ago here.

Spartacus and I have already discussed the spectrum-concept further offsite; once I've got his thumb up (versus, say, merely one of his fingers), I'm going to post his take on what the test and its analysis told him, and where it led him.

Not to be a partypooper, I'm probably not going to do the same for myself here, though. While my own views on politics and (to a lesser extent) social and economic issues have been hanging from my blog's clothesline here for some time, I really don't want to bias anyone's testing at Political Compass, one way or another.

The Compass people also demonstrate where various worldshakers – good and bad, yesterday and today – plot out on that graph/compass. I will say that (with some interest and genuine comfort) my neighbors include Mohandas Gandhi, and the (Fourteenth) Dalai Lama. And I'm in an entirely different quadrant from His Holiness, Benedetto XVI!

Okay, now class: begin the test. There are no right or wrong answers, and you do not have to put your name on the papers. But I will be collecting them. Ready, set…

 

"Through the eyes of a child, you will see..."

I'm not going to add my voice – at least, not much – to the muted crowd-roar reflecting on the staggering events of this day, six years ago. I will be the first, though, to assert that I do stand with even the most conservative of my friends – especially the lovely, intractable Anon E. Mouse (see previous blog-posting).

Sometimes I can believe that in her eyes, the Decider who's put our country in such an awful mess – wrapping himself in the flag and standing on the ruins in New York, Washington, and Pennsylvania – can do nothing wrong for this country and its place in the world. All our ills, all our wounds, are exclusively and totally the fault of the other guy… usually someone reading from the Koran, but sometimes speaking Spanish or Ebonics, or – worse – voting Democrat.

Nonetheless… at certain places all Americans are one; the events of September 11, 2001, build one such place, and Anon and I stand there together once a year – and I refrain from making bunny-ears behind her when the group-photo is taken, so to speak.

This afternoon I forwarded around to a dozen-plus friends and family an email she sent me yesterday; the first of its two embedded photos just breaks my heart:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 3:12 PM

With the significance of today's date – and suspending all political disagreements for the moment – I'd like to pass along something from a dear friend who sits across from the political spectrum from me.

You know how I feel about what we're doing in our current military theaters of operation, and the "decider" who's put us in them. Yet the fact remains that – beyond the ongoing deplorable conditions for the citizens of these countries – our own blood continues being spilled there. These are our sons and daughters, fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters… some of whom we will never laugh and smile and cry and pray with again.

I support our soldiers (Marines, Air Force, Navy, Coast Guard, National Guard – and civilians, too), and would love to see them all back home, safe in our arms, and soon. Until then, though, God be with them, and the suffering peoples they move among. Amen.

Regards,

AgingChild

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Monday, September 10, 2007 8:56 AM

REMINDER TO PRAY 

Would You Send This Please

We have a long list of good friends whose husbands are deploying to Iraq next month. One of the wives sent me this. We feel compelled to send it on. Your prayers are deeply appreciated. These guys deserve our love, our hugs and most powerfully, our prayers.

Prayer Request:

I understand that life in Iraq is very difficult to bear right now. Our troops need our prayers for strength, endurance and safety. Send this on after a short prayer; please don't break it:

"Lord, hold our troops in your loving hands. Protect them as they protect us. Bless them and their families for the selfless acts they perform for us in our time of need. Amen."

When you receive this, please stop for a moment and say a prayer for our troops around the world. There's nothing attached; just send this to all in your address book. Do not let it stop with you, please -- of all the gifts you could give a US Soldier, Sailor, Airman, or Marine deployed in harm's way, prayer is the very best!!!

I don't know a thing about the source of the two images; I'll update this posting with them when/if I can get the info – there must be quite a story to the brave boy receiving what I'm guessing is his late father's (or mother's) flag.

I do object in the strongest possible terms to the Right's linking of the al Qaeda's attack on us six years ago, with the turmoil the administration chose to bring Iraq. But here I've kept my mouth – keyboard – largely shut. No need to say more; look at that boy's face again.

…No, let me bring in one more voice. Friend Chuckles (whose scripts/screenplays will make it up here at some point) was the first to respond; I'll forward this one around, too, shortly

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 3:17 PM
Subject: Re: FW: Would you send this please?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TQY_slTJQE&feature=PlayList&p=1F3F4FD21AB8F6FE&index=26

you need to play this for today.

chuckles

Country music is not my genre of choice – but daughter-one Shellie does like it, and has more than once opened my ears and eyes to how Nashville (or Bronson) cries from the American heart better than just about anyone else.

Amen; sing it!

Hooraw for Michigan

And the email keeps coming in! While I'm out meeting HR folks, or at home rearranging stamps or just peering at my belly-button, I'm still in touch with the world, and vice-versa.

Old friend and foil Anon E. Mouse sent me an email yesterday; I read it this morning, and pounced on it immediately. It appears to have originated with a Tall-Corn fellow I'll call John Smith:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Monday, September 10, 2007 2:09 PM

Subject: hooray for michigan

This was checked out on SNOPES and found to be exactly as is stated.

Date: Mon, 21 May 2007 11:43 AM

Professor Tells Muslims to Leave Country

Hooray for Michigan State University!

Well, what do we have here? Looks like a small case of some people being able to dish it out, but not take it. Let's start at the top.

The story begins at Michigan State University with a mechanical engineering professor named Indrek Wichman. Wichman sent an e-mail to the Muslim Student's Association. The e-mail was in response to the students' protest of the Danish cartoons that portrayed the Prophet Muhammad as a terrorist. The group had complained the cartoons were "hate speech."

Enter Professor Wichman. In his e-mail, he said the following:

Dear Moslem Association:

As a professor of Mechanical Engineering here at MSU I intend to protest your protest. I am offended not by cartoons, but by more mundane things like beheadings of civilians, cowardly attacks on public buildings, suicide murders, murders of Catholic priests (the latest in Turkey), burnings of Christian churches, the continued persecution of Coptic Christians in Egypt, the imposition of Sharia law on non-Muslims, the rapes of Scandinavian girls and women (called "whores" in your culture), the murder of film directors in Holland, and the rioting and looting in Paris, France. This is what offends me, a soft-spoken person and academic, and many, many of my colleagues. I counsel your dissatisfied, aggressive, brutal, and uncivilized slave-trading Moslems to be very aware of this as you proceed with your infantile "protests." If you do not like the values of the West - see the 1st Amendment - you are free to leave. I hope for God's sake that most of you choose that option. Please return to your ancestral homelands and build them up yourselves instead of troubling Americans.

Cordially,

I. S. Wichman

Professor of Mechanical Engineering

As you can imagine, the Muslim group at the university didn't like this too well. They're demanding that Wichman be reprimanded and mandatory diversity training for faculty and a seminar on hate and discrimination for freshman. Now the chapter of CAIR has jumped into the fray. CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations, apparently doesn't believe that the good professor had the right to express his opinion.

For its part, the university is standing its ground, saying the e-mail was private, and they don't intend to publicly condemn his remarks. That will probably change. Wichman says he never intended for his e-mail to be made public, and wouldn't have used the same strong language if he'd known it was going to get out.

How's the left going to handle this one? If you're in favor of the freedom of speech, as in the case of Ward Churchill, will the same protections be demanded for Indrek Wichman? I doubt it.

Send this to your friends, and ask them to do the same. Tell them to keep passing it around until the whole country gets it. We are in a war. This political correctness crap is getting old and killing us.

If you agree with this, please send it to all your friends, if not simply delete.

Keep the Faith!

John Smith

She must have heard my eyes rolling. I sent back to her:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 11:56 AM

Nope; I don't agree.

The university is quite right in standing by their man over issues of free speech and the privacy of his communication.

However – and I think most of the "Right" has lost sight of this – the students' protests, and Wichman's complaint, simply are not equivalent issues. The students were protesting the depiction of Muhammad in those Danish cartoons; they found it offensive. I don't, but I'm not as sensitive, nor as vociferous. Regardless; the students were well within their rights to protest an issue that, though overseas, they found personally insulting.

Or should we Christians, in turn, not complain if someone, say, in Malaysia does a TV and internet commercial featuring (this is just a what-if, okay?) Jesus climbing down off the cross, soul-kissing a young lady in the crowd, and selling her father a car and bowl of noodles?

Wichman, again, was well within his own rights to notify that student group he'd felt they had gone over the line (they had not), and that by his own (spurious and specious) perceptions they were being hypocritical. And the group had indeed stepped over the line by making public a private communication without his consent. (See the Snopes article; he at least claims he'd thought he was emailing just one of the students, and not the full group.)

However – and this seems to me so typical of the knee-jerk, anti-Islam, huge-tarbrush-wielding bigmouths of the "Right" – by associating this group of peaceful students with the blood-drenched, atrocity-rich fanatic radical fundamentalist pseudo-Islamist terrorists currently plaguing much of the Middle East and beyond, Wichman fanned the flames of the hatred that often passes for dialog in both West and East; he brings that dialog to a common and embarrassing low; and he has personally, unfairly, and derogatorily insulted a group of people legitimately exercising Constitutional rights. And this John Smith fellow is simply adding more gasoline and throwing lit matches.

If the students had been speaking at Wichman's own level of reasoning and sensitivity, they would have been accusing him personally of torturing Jews, killing blacks, murdering babies, burning widows, and torching and plundering whole cities – things that have been done (and are still being done today) throughout history in the name of Jesus.

We Christians too easily forget that our faith-history is guilty of much innocent spilled blood, and anti-Christians could make a good and reasonable case against us, pivoting just on Matthew 7:16, "By their fruits you will know them", and James 2:18, "I will demonstrate my faith to you from my works". Indeed, I suspect that Judgment Day will see many, many cries for justice against us Bible-wielders, and justice will indeed be served us.

In a genuine debate, the points would unquestionably go to the students. They stayed with their topic on what they felt to be an insult, and did not stoop to pouting, juvenile argumentation. Wichman cannot claim the same, and the university would in turn be within its own institutional rights to reprimand the man for being unneedfully provocative. That they haven't, and may well not, is their business. Their own position (though I don't agree) may in fact be wise, in refusing to spotlight it beyond where it's already gone.

I will admit that I do largely concur with some of the us-or-them folks on the right who are all for showing the door to non-citizen cultural hypocrites who take advantage of this country's broad protections for all, and use their stance under that umbrella to incite violence and hatred; that's not what we're about.

But it's also not what the students were doing. Yet that's exactly what Wichman was doing, and what Smith is applauding. Jesus would be ashamed of them both.

Regards,

AgingChild

Ms. Mouse was not going to let this be; she respectfully dodged my counterpoints, and responded with a silly argument she's brought up before:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 1:00 PM

Okay, but why is it alright for minorities to voice their opinion and call it their civil rights but it's not right for the white's to voice their opinion?

Regards,
Anon E. Mouse

I decided not to point out that she'd switched topics on me, rather than address my points. I answered her:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 1:30 PM

Certainly a reasonable question! Yes, I'll take it.

In our free society, all individuals and legitimate associations are entitled to be able to present their views in the court of public opinion. I bristle where this constitutionally-protected freedom is commandeered to – as I said – push hatred and non-civility, whether by minority or by majority.

Yes; if it's an African-American advocating the firebombing of Lester Maddox's First National Bank, s/he's going too far. Likewise if a cowardly crowd of sheet-wearers stirs up a riot to go hang some darkies. Same also for a Muslim on Main Street USA advocating the violent overthrow of the oppressive American régime. Ditto a fellow with a white collar, ornate robe, and mighty cross demanding his followers drag all Muslims out of this country because some folks claiming to follow the same Koran are butchering children and horsewhipping women halfway around the world.

Free speech is, and must continue to be, protected. It is not, however, the be-all and end-all of citizenship. For a just society to flourish and remain healthy, there must also be a genuine, responsible civility, or there'd be no point in instituting protection (i.e., the police) of the citizens heeding, or disagreeing with, that same speech.

Regarding that Michigan issue, both sides made good use of their speech-freedoms, but only one was jeopardizing civil order in doing so. Smith and Witch-Hunt – excuse me; I mean "Wichman" – pose shallow, transparent, bigoted arguments, whereas the students (from what I've seen; I concede there may be more to it… but I'd think that would have made the news as well, at least on Fox) kept themselves reined in, and clamored only for intercultural sensitivity… a concept that may well be beyond Smith and Wichman.

In general, modern-day America has lost sight of the meaning of the concept of freedom, insisting that "freedom" means unrestricted liberty to do whatever one darned well pleases. It does not; our sloppy language leads its speakers into sloppy and fallacious assumptions and reasoning. Unrestricted personal indulgence is license; see Definition 3 in Webster's, and also check a related word, licentiousness.

"Freedom" in a civil society is the unimpeded doing of what one ought to do, not the self-indulgent pursuit of what one wants to do – or burning polling stations would be a legitimate means of voting for/against one's candidate of choice, for instance. Free speech embraced the burning of draft cards a generation ago; it cannot embrace the burning of bridges today.

Regards,

AC

I ran this e-dialog past Spartacus, who is extremely intolerant of BS from the left or from the right, though politically is farther to the left of me. Sparks answered simply, and – baffled – perhaps just a bit uncharitably:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 6:31 PM

and this is an educated woman?

Too many people seem to take the term "conservative" to mean not having to think.

I can hardly qualify as a gentleman – but I will at least defend my opponents (as would Spartacus, of course). I explained to him:

-----Original Message-----
Sent: Tuesday, September 11, 2007 6:54 PM
Subject: RE: Hooray for Sanity Clause!

Correct on both counts, sir!

Friend Mouse has also most eagerly agreed to provide a job reference for me (so I'm a little more soft-stepping around her) – she and I worked for [a particular conservative firm] around the same time, and I even sat in for her a couple times when she was on vacation, either snorkeling off the Caymans, or firing away at the NRA range.

She has very high, professional accreditation, is lovely on the eye, has a sweet voice, has weathered serious health problems (I was one of several friends helping her through after she lost a breast to cancer, which had left her feeling her life was over… then she married, and she's never been happier)… and politically I think she's an utter bonehead. Not stupid! But unaccountably lockstep with the you-know-whos. I may yet scratch a bald spot in my scalp over her, and her ilk.

I'm also pickled tink that she and I can circle a common issue and growl like the merciless dogs we are… and still be able to fetch and bark together, with nary a nip to the ear (Michael Vick would've given us up as hopeless, heh-heh). I can't hope for her to do anything but constantly make right turns (never noticing she and her rowing crew are getting nowhere), but I want to put a face on the left for her – be an advocate for the non-conservatives – and do what I can to both feed the dialog, and keep it civil.

Regards,

Acey

Likely Mouse finds me wishy-washy and pompous... and I may in fact be driving her to her own bald spot – for which I apologize in advance! But it's fun having friends who don't agree with you (along with those who do): like the occasional cold-water plunge, it's quite invigorating… although a good blast of nice hot steam can be quite the thing.

I think, uh, some of us geyser driving her crazy…