tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-302118992024-03-07T15:23:16.092-08:00The American IndividualistPolitical and cultural commentaryAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.comBlogger24125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1175906932906960472007-04-06T17:45:00.000-07:002007-04-06T17:48:52.923-07:00Awarded for my court report<em>I was recently awarded 3rd place for coverage of crime/police/courts in Division III of the New York Press Association’s 2006 Better Newspaper Contest. Here is the article that earned me the award:</em> <br /><br /><br /><strong>Jeannot gets life without parole<br />Murder victim's family say prayers were answered</strong><br /><br />By Joseph Kellard <br />October 2006<br /><br /><br />Perhaps no statement encapsulated both the brutality of her son's murder and the deep pain she and her family feel than the one Kathy Calabrese read to Judge Meryl Berkowitz while her son¹s killer, Herve Jeannot, sat nearby, awaiting his sentencing.<br /><br />Noting that the bullet wounds her son, Robert Calabrese Jr., sustained to his head left the family no choice but to have a closed-casket funeral, Kathy leaned on the podium and, fighting back tears, cried, "I couldn't even see my son after he died. I couldn't even kiss him, I couldn't even touch him."<br /><br />Calabrese, 24, a Long Beach native, was Kathy and Robert Calabrese's oldest son, brother to Gina Cuenza, 28, and Chris and Nick Calabrese, 23 and 20. Only Nick was absent from the Mineola courtroom on Nov. 1 when family members asked Berkowitz to give Jeannot -- convicted of first-degree murder and second-degree criminal possession of a weapon in August -- the maximum penalty. Berkowitz sentenced the 25-year-old Deer Park man to life in prison without parole for his execution-style shooting of Calabrese in Island Park in December 2004. <br /><br />As each member of the Calabrese family read an emotional statement, Jeannot, an ex-Marine dressed in a black suit and blue collared shirt and tie, sat motionless, staring straight ahead.<br /><br />Robert Calabrese Sr., noting that "Bobby" loved to laugh and play practical jokes, stressed the numbness and pain his family has suffered since his son's murder. "Today, in my house," he told Berkowitz, "laughter is the exception, not the rule."<br /><br />A boy who grew up playing football and baseball, Robert Jr. made many friends with his generous demeanor. He saved birds with broken wings and captured flies in cups to set them free outside, his sister once noted.<br /><br />Wearing a gold crucifix over a brown sweater, Cuenza asked Berkowitz to consider, above all, the emotional impact her brother's murder has had on her family, described as painful and disastrous. "When we're not crying on the outside, we are crying and sick inside," she said, calling Jeannot "downright evil." <br /><br />"None of my children have that sparkle in their smile anymore," Kathy<br />said as friends and family members cried.<br /><br />Before making her statement, Kathy read another prepared by Nick. “I'm weak, emotionally unstable and messed up,” he wrote. “I'm at the lowest point in my life, and I don't think it's going to get any easier ... I don't want to live anymore.”<br /><br />Nick and Chris both idolized their older brother, a champion wrestler at Kellenberg Memorial High School in Uniondale who transferred to Long Beach High, where he graduated in 1998. After working at various jobs, Robert was planning to take the police test to become an officer and follow the path of his father, a retired officer with the Long Beach Police Department. He was murdered the day before the test.<br /><br />Jeannot's family sat silently in the courtroom, his parents wearing blank expressions. After Jeannot declined to speak, Berkowitz mentioned the many letters she had received from his family and friends, who pleaded for compassion and leniency.<br /><br />The judge drew parallels between the victim and his murderer, including their similar age, good looks and families who loved them. "But on Dec. 3, 2004," Berkowitz said, "Jeannot chose to turn his back on the love his family gave him." Instead, she said, he turned to Mark Orlando.<br /><br />Orlando, 36, of Bayshore, worked with Jeannot at Professional Credit Services, a Farmingdale collection agency where the two accomplices were arrested and charged with Calabrese's murder on Dec. 9, 2004.<br /><br />During their trials -- three for Jeannot and one for Orlando -- prosecutors argued that Calabrese, a Garden City mortgage broker, placed bets for them on sports events in the fall of 2004, and Orlando accumulated a $17,000 debt and Jeannot $1,000.<br /><br />That Dec. 3, Orlando called Calabrese to request a meeting in Island Park under the pretense that he would pay him his debt. At around 8:30 p.m., prosecutors said, Orlando lured Calabrese away from heavily traveled Austin Boulevard behind stores on Broadway.<br /><br />Once there, Calabrese got out of his 2003 Infiniti and approached Orlando, believing he was to receive a payment. The two men hugged and, prosecutors said, Orlando grabbed the victim's shirt and yanked it over his head to immobilize him for Jeannot, who emerged from a hiding spot, came up behind Calabrese and shot him in the back of the head with a .44-caliber Magnum revolver. After Calabrese hit the ground, Jeannot shot him twice more in the head, and the two men fled in Orlando's car, according to the prosecution. <br /><br />Soon afterward, residents who had heard the gunfire found Calabrese lying face down in the street.<br /><br />During Jeannot's trials, his lawyer, Daniel Hochheiser of Manhattan, argued that his client was merely a witness to the crime and failed to report the murder for fear that Orlando would harm him and his family, and that police coerced a confession from Jeannot.<br /><br />Jeannot confessed that Orlando paid him $4,000 to kill Calabrese, and he said he tossed the murder weapon off the Sloop Channel Bridge. The Marine Bureau recovered the gun, and police found the cash in Jeannot’s bedroom closet. <br /><br />At his first trial in September 2005, a jury deliberated for 71 hours and was deadlocked in a 10-2 vote to convict before Judge David Sullivan declared a mistrial. In February 2006, Jeannot's second trial failed to yield a verdict, only this time the jury voted 11-1 not to convict. "At that point, we all questioned whether justice would be done," Robert Sr. said.<br /><br />Jeannot's third trial, this summer, lasted more than four weeks. After deliberating for less than four hours, the jury convicted him on Aug. 11.<br /><br />For Chris Calabrese, the most difficult part of all the trials was listening to the presentation of evidence. "Just hearing some of the physical evidence of how my brother died was hard," said Chris, who told Berkowitz his brother was caring, intelligent and loved life.<br /><br />During Orlando's trial in June 2005, his attorney, Dennis Lemke of Mineola, argued that Orlando was unaware that Jeannot planned to shoot Calabrese, and he never called police about the murder because Jeannot had threatened to kill him and his wife if he revealed the crime. Orlando was convicted of second-degree murder in June 2005, and two months later he received the maximum sentence of 25 years to life.<br /><br />Jeannot's lawyer at his sentencing, William Aronwald of White Plains, asked the judge to give Jeannot the same sentence, arguing that Orlando had the relationship with Calabrese and that Jeannot was merely the hired gunman. "Consider the fact that Mark Orlando is the one who actually made the plans to kill him," Aronwald said.<br /><br />"Murder for hire certainly deserves life without parole," Sheryl<br />Anania, executive assistant district attorney for litigation, argued.<br /><br />Berkowitz told Jeannot that if he had only asked for $50 each from all the people who wrote her letters, he could have paid off his debt. But the judge stressed that she thought his motives ran deeper than money. "I believe this was a cold-blooded murder to impress Orlando," Berkowitz said.<br /><br />Robert Calabrese Sr. told Berkowitz that, since New York state is without the death penalty, "[Jeannot] deserves every year, every month, every day, every minute, every second of his sentence," stressing each unit of time with a raised voice. As he finished speaking, he shot a stare at Jeannot. "Remember," he said, "there will always be a Calabrese waiting to prevent you from getting out."<br /><br />When Berkowitz announced the sentence, the Calabreses shouted with joy and applauded briefly. Jeannot's family sat dazed, and then some began to cry as court officers took him away in handcuffs. The Jeannots left the courthouse without comment.<br /><br />Outside the courtroom, hugging relatives and friends, Kathy Calabrese and her daughter said that their prayers were answered, and Robert Sr. expressed relief that he no longer had to come to court.<br /><br />Chris, who had asked Berkowitz to sentence Jeannot to an upstate prison, not the county's "country club" prison, said he wanted Jeannot to serve his sentence far away from his family and know the real meaning of hard time. "I'm just happy to know," Chris said, "that he¹s going to be treated like a girl the rest of his life."<br /><br /><br /><em>Comments about this article? Email Joseph Kellard at Theainet@optonline.net.</em>American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1170289648276960022007-01-31T16:25:00.000-08:002007-01-31T16:27:28.306-08:00Prepping for the big game<em>From TV sales to ocean swims, Super Bowl is big business</em><br /><br />By Joseph Kellard<br />January 30, 2007<br /><br /><br />Each football season, Jeff Rosenthal roots for the New York Jets and Giants to earn Super Bowl berths. The co-owner of Home Appliance TV & Video in Oceanside is a fan of neither team, but wants them in the game because he knows that would boost his business.<br /><br />Unfortunately for Rosenthal, the Chicago Bears will line up against the Indianapolis Colts in Miami in Super Bowl XLI on Sunday. Nonetheless, the Super Bowl is the most watched one-day event each year, viewed by up to 140 million Americans -- which means television sales typically peak during the weeks leading up to the game, according to the Consumer Electronics Association. <br /><br />At Home Appliance, sales of HD and plasma televisions usually jump 20 percent, and even more if a New York team is playing. “Sales were off the wall when the Giants made it to the Super Bowl back in 2001,” Rosenthal said. “It depends a lot on how much people care about the game, but even if people don’t like the sport, for some reason they want to have a party and bring people to their house.”<br /><br />The Super Bowl’s immense popularity has made it not only a money-maker for many businesses, but a reason for almost any kind of celebration. Many Americans treat the day as a holiday, gathering with family and friends. The Super Bowl generates the highest Nielsen ratings and thus greater TV sales for appliance stores, and since game day is second only to Thanksgiving in single-day food consumption, it fires up the food industry.<br /><br />Just ask Franco Abballe, who is in the business of selling some of Super Bowl Sunday’s staple grub: pizza, chicken wings, burgers and soda. “Super Bowl Sunday is one of our earmarked days of the year,” said Abballe, owner of Cinelli’s Pizza & Grill on Davison Avenue in Oceanside. On a typical Sunday, Cinelli’s sells an average of 50 pizzas; on Super Sunday that total rises as high as 125. Except for what he described as “the king of all days.” Good Friday at his Cinelli’s location in Franklin Square, a heavily catholic area -- Abballe said, “Super Bowl Sunday is up there with New Year’s Day and Valentine’s Day, which are monster take-out days.”<br /><br />Lance Denni, a co-owner of Lawson Deli in Oceanside, said that on Super Sunday his shop produces about 200 feet of heroes, doubling the average for other big days and events like Christmas, christenings and confirmations.”Of course, if a New York team is in it, it’s always best,” Denni said, echoing Rosenthal. “One of our biggest days was when the Giants were in it a few years ago.”<br /><br />Stop & Shop is seeing increasing annual sales for Super Bowl-related items, said Rob Kean, a spokesman for the supermarket chain. And in addition to the traditional foods the chain sells, such as snacks, Kean noted that newer items include Super Bowl-themed cakes and shrimp platters.<br /><br />”In many ways this is one of our biggest weeks of the year,” Kean said. “The demand for certain items is almost like a holiday rush for us.”<br /><br />While restaurant-bars also rake in the big bucks -- as places like Churchill’s in Rockville Centre fill up with patrons who pay $50 to eat and drink all they can, and where some gambling pools promise winners pots of tens of thousands of dollars -- Super Sunday remains the top at-home party event of the year, even bigger than New Year’s Eve, attracting an average of 17 people per party, according to Hallmark Cards Inc.<br /><br />Nancy and Gerard Achstatter and their three college- and high school-aged children throw an annual Super Bowl bash that involves up to 20 friends. A family of Jets fans, the Achstatters serve everything from nachos and chili to cakes and cookies, and look forward to each Super Bowl even if their team hasn’t earned a trip to one since 1969.<br /><br />“It’s a nice chance after the holidays and when it’s cold to root for a team, even if it’s not your team,” said Nancy, who in high school was a sideline baton-twirler for the Jets.<br /><br />The Achstatters’ main guests are fellow Oceansiders Bob and Betsy Transom, who can be counted among those who aren’t necessarily football fans but gather at Super Bowl parties for the companionship. But Betsy is quick to point out that things have changed this season. “I started watching football because of my son, Craig, and I was really into the games this year, and I even watched the playoffs,” she said. “But even before this, watching the Super Bowl is like the ‘American Idol’ phenomenon, in that you’re all hooked into the same live event. It makes you feel very connected.”<br /><br />On the morning of the big game, the Achstatters and Transoms can be found at the Oceanside Kiwanis Club¹s annual Super Bowl pancake breakfast at St. Anthony’s Church on Anchor Avenue. The breakfast illustrates an event that attracts patrons who may not care about football, but who nevertheless celebrate the day nonetheless. Each year hundreds of children and adults crowd St. Anthony’s cafeteria to get their fill of pancakes, eggs, sausage, bagels, orange juice and other fixings and to play games. Recognizing all this, the Oceanside Kiwanians keep using the day for their primary fund-raiser. <br /><br />“The Super Bowl has become like a national holiday,” said Betsy Transom, whose husband is a past president of Oceanside Kiwanis. “And with the pancake breakfast, we’ve developed quite a following, and people look for it every year.” <br /><br />The breakfast, which began in the early 1990s at Terrell Firehouse in northwest Oceanside, raised enough funds to send as many as three poorer children to Kamp Kiwanis upstate each summer. But it has grown so much that Kiwanis not only sends more than 30 kids on this trip, but they also fully outfit and equip them.<br /><br />“It’s unbelievable how big it’s gotten,” said Cy Lishnoff, a past district president of Kiwanis who remembers the first breakfast at the firehouse. “It’s at the point now where a number of people tell me, ‘You don’t have to tell me about it, I come every year.”<br /><br />That morning, another growing tradition, begun by a native of Oceanside, takes place in Long Beach. The polar bear swim is the brainchild of Peter Meyers, who first took a dip in the city’s frigid ocean with a friend on Super Sunday 10 years ago. The following year, 18 people joined them, and the polar bear population grew each January -- considerably so after 2000.<br /><br />That year, Meyers, a boys’ basketball coach, made the event a fund-raiser for the Make-A-Wish Foundation after one of his players had died. Through sales of sweatshirts and donations, they raised $7,000 to go toward granting sick children their wishes.<br /><br />“Since it’s on Super Bowl Sunday,” Meyers explained, “everyone is in such a festive and giving mood that we have people who come up to us and say, ‘You know what, I was going to bet $100 on the Super Bowl, but I’d rather give it to a kid who needs a wish.”<br /><br />Last year, the swim attracted some 3,000 participants and raised $190,000. All told, Meyers and Make-A-Wish have generated $400,000 and helped 50 children. “It’s a beach party in February,” said Meyers, who catches the big game at the local VFW with fellow polar bears. “You go in the water a thousand times in the summer, but if you go in this one time on Super Bowl Sunday, everybody talks about it for a long time.”<br /><br /><br />Copyright © 2007 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1170288309474496462007-01-31T16:02:00.000-08:002007-01-31T16:05:09.490-08:00Is “Johnny U” for you?By Joseph Kellard<br />January 31, 2007<br /><br /><br />On Super Bowl Sunday, Peyton Manning of the Indianapolis Colts will once again don the same white helmet with blue horseshoes that another star quarterback wore in a championship game nearly 50 years ago. I draw this timely parallel simply to recommend a biography that matches its hype, but for reasons other than those made on the Mike & the Mad Dog radio show on WFAN (AM 660) or in Commentary magazine.<br /><br />“Johnny U: The Life and Times of Johnny Unitas,” by Tom Callahan, is a conversational-style account of the legendary Baltimore Colts quarterback. The book is based on interviews with Unitas’s teammates, opponents, friends and relatives, and captures the essence of a man many consider the greatest to ever play his position.<br /><br />Sports fans or anyone eager to read about an admirable individual should read “Johnny U,” if only to observe examples of his famous “cool,” both on the field and off, and particularly while under pressure -- a product of his quiet confidence. One of the Hall of Famer¹s college coaches from Louisville, a team that fell to 1-8 one season, said of him: “Losing didn’t kill his self-confidence … He was the most confident person -- confident in his own ability -- that I ever met, that I think anyone ever met.”<br /><br />In part, Unitas’s abilities were grew out of his dedication to the game, a quality Callahan highlights in his biography. “Every week, John sat and watched both [televised games: the Bears and the Browns],” a Louisville teammate recalled. “‘C’mon, it’s a beautiful day, let’s go out, I’d say. ‘No, I have to see the games.’ ‘You mean to tell me that after practicing all week, after sitting through all the meetings, after playing every single down of every single game, you still haven’t had enough football?’ ‘Nope.’ None of the rest of us knew exactly what we wanted to be. He did.”<br /><br />Unitas’s renowned work ethic was embodied best in his relationship with his top receiver, Raymond Berry. The duo routinely worked together even after team practices on mastering their pass-and-catch precision and on two-minute drills that proved invaluable in big spots. <br /><br />“Johnny U” also shines a light on both Unitas’s exceptional football smarts and leadership, exemplified by an ability to tap his vast memory bank to call plays on his own like no other quarterback before him.<br /><br />“You couldn’t outthink Unitas,” New York Giants defenseman Sam Huff said. “When you thought run, he passed. When you thought pass, he ran. When you thought conventional, he was unconventional. When you tried thinking in reverse, he double-reversed. It made me dizzy ... We were one of the greatest defensive teams ever put together ... But we didn¹t have a defense for Unitas.”<br /><br />One critique of “Johnny U” I encountered is that Callahan failed to dig deeper and answer more questions about his private and family life. Certainly another outstanding biography, “When Pride Still Mattered,” David Maraniss’s take on legendary Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, is heavy on such details. Yet that book still managed to detour from a road most modern biographers like to travel. A road on which all sorts of non-essential, often unsubstantiated claims about a subject are made and blow up in an alleged attempt to make the subject more “human,” or the biography more “balanced.” But dig deeper into the biographer¹s motives and you’ll likely find he was determined to fit feet of clay on his admirable or heroic subject. <br /><br />Instead, Callahan opted to focus on what is most relevant about any individual’s life: his productive abilities, his work, his profession. These values primarily give life its purpose, and, above all else, reveal a man’s core. In “Johnny U,” Callahan shows us a man who essentially loved his work and performed it exceedingly well and with shining confidence, particularly on the grandest stages.<br /><br />In 1958, Unitas and the Colts defeated Huff and the Giants in the NFL championship, later dubbed “The Greatest Game Ever Played.” In this classic, first-ever overtime battle, Unitas commanded a two-minute, game-tying march downfield and an 80-yard, game-winning drive that became signature innovations of his quarterbacking. The game generated unprecedented television ratings that catapulted the pro game in popularity on a par with Major League Baseball.<br /><br />Immediately after winning his first pro championship, Unitas simply<br />turned and walked off the field. “You weren’t going to see him jump up and down,” said one teammate. “He didn’t have to do that. It was one of the best things about him.”<br /><br /><br />Copyright © 2007 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1169091292795714382007-01-17T19:33:00.000-08:002007-02-02T17:45:37.270-08:00Empire Zone is another Band AidBy Joseph Kellard <br />January 15, 2007 <br /><br />Air Stream, the Oceanside-based food corporation, will likely receive Empire Zone status and thus be eligible for many tax incentives. <br /><br />I certainly champion tax cuts and breaks, primarily since this means <br />productive individuals get to keep the money they’ve earned, rather than have bureaucrats confiscate it from them under threat of jail time. <br /><br />But the need for the Empire Zone to keep companies from relocating points to a much larger problem, to which this tax program is merely a Band Aid. Looked at in the long-term, tax cuts alone simply shift their recipients’ tax burden to other individuals. The state may reimburse local municipalities for lost tax revenue due to the cuts, but those reimbursement dollars are also taken from taxpayers. So in the long term, tax cuts without commensurable or greater spending cuts --particularly to major, enormously costly government-run programs such as Medicaid/Medicare and Social Security -- are ultimately counterproductive. <br /><br />Yet instead of demanding cuts in spending for these ever-expanding social programs, some people call for greater taxation, particularly for the wealthy, who nevertheless bear the greatest burden due, in part, to “progressive” income taxes. <br /><br />People opposed to the Empire Zone, which aims to lessen the tax burden on businesses rather than have them move to tax-friendlier areas, are like those who complain about U.S. companies that incorporate or put their income in foreign lands with few or no specific taxes. While some paint these companies as “unpatriotic,” the reality is that they act in the same spirit as America's original patriots. <br /><br />A few years ago, Stanley Works, a Connecticut tool maker, and Ingersoll-Rand, a New Jersey industrial manufacturer, proposed to move to Bermuda, partly because the island has no income tax. With this move, Stanley Works expected to cut corporate taxes annually from about $110 million to $80 million; Ingersoll-Rand from about $155 million to under $115 million. <br /><br />What the most productive companies do with their tax savings is save or invest most of them to expand their existing businesses or create new ones. This translates, properly, into greater profits for them, and greater products and services, more jobs and better earnings for others. <br /><br />Yet representative Charles Rangel of New York had denounced these practices. "Some companies flying the Stars and Stripes renounce America when it comes to paying their taxes,” he said. “They choose profits over patriotism. But supporting America is more than about waving the flag and saluting -- it's about sharing the sacrifice." <br /><br />Translation: companies seeking a "tax haven" -- i.e., greater economic freedom, overseas to make and keep their money, are essentially unpatriotic; so government must eliminate these freedoms, shackle the self-interests of individuals and force them to sacrifice to pay their “fair share.” <br /><br />But to suggest that Americans who use available freedoms to avoid (not “evade”) more burdensome taxes aren’t paying their “fair share,” is to say that they are being unfair about allowing politicians like Rangel to continue to increasingly pick their pockets. <br /><br />A patriotic politician wouldn’t demand the injustice that some Americans, because they earn more money, should be taxed at a higher rate than lesser wage-earners. If fairness is their concern, then the Rangels in government should nix the progressive income tax and have everyone, rich and poor, pay taxes at equal rates. <br /><br />A patriotic politician wouldn’t enact laws to eliminate the freedoms provided by tax havens. Instead, he would champion these as legitimate means for all Americans to protect their property from bureaucrats’ confiscatory hands -- property they have a right to selfishly pursue, keep and spend as they see fit. <br /><br />A patriotic politician would assert loudly that taxes are too high for all Americans, and that the U.S. tax system is progressively tightening its stranglehold on them. And a patriotic politician -- whether a Democrat or Republican -- would find the courage to cut or phase out government spending on major redistributive programs, like Medicare and Social Security, our nation’s middle class entitlements, which alone would provide substantive, substantial tax deductions for all. <br /><br />Yet politicians like Rangel not only won¹t cut spending, they focus on ways to continue hiking them while creating diversions. One such diversion is to paint companies that seek tax breaks overseas as "unpatriotic” – all the while evading how our nation was founded by tax revolters. <br /><br />America's original patriots defied Britain's heavy taxation, exemplified by their revolts against the Stamp and Townshend acts, and by signing the Declaration of Independence, which charged that among King George III's "repeated injuries and usurpations" was his "imposing taxes on us, without our consent." <br /><br />Because Bermuda's tax system reflects what America's once was -- before the income tax became a fixture after 1913 -- companies like Stanley Works and Ingersoll-Rand are brothers-in-arms with our nation's original patriots. Their relocation to tax-friendly foreign lands represents their Boston Tea Party. <br /><br />Meanwhile, many small home owners to corporations move from states with heavy taxation, like New York, to states with comparatively less burdensome taxes, like North Carolina. According to Rangel's illogic, however, these individuals and companies "renounce" their states, and should sacrifice by staying put to pay their fair share. Actually, these individuals are simply seeking ways to retain more of their property that our founders championed as their right to keep. <br /><br />Today, many Americans want tax cuts, but not without the necessary spending cuts that would make those cuts substantive. They consent when our political representatives sustain and expand the entitlement programs they favor, but cry when their outstanding and growing costs rear their ugly heads in many areas, from increased sales and property taxes to automobile and health insurance costs. <br /><br />While some of our politicians understandably praise the Empire Zone as a good measure, I’m fighting for the day when this program’s call for reduced taxation are coupled with substantive spending cuts, and become the rule, not the exception, everywhere. Eventually, Americans and their representatives will have to consent to these realities, or otherwise face having to flee their states or the (former) land of the free. <br /><br /><br />* Joseph Kellard is a journalist living in New York. <br /><br />Copyright © 2007 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1167781784111019412007-01-02T15:47:00.000-08:002007-02-02T17:45:57.543-08:00The Childless’ Critics: A Discussion with Dr. Hurd<em>Here is a Q & A (which reads more like a conversation) that I did with Dr. Michael Hurd back in March 2001</em>. <br /><br /><br /><strong>Joseph Kellard</strong>: What are your thoughts on parents who are everything from condescending to contemptuous toward individuals who choose to remain childless?<br /><br />One such person wrote: "I am sorry for those who swear off children. They pass through life without a defining, irreplaceable human experience. One cannot help from feeling sad for those who merely refrain from having children because they consider them 'inconvenient.' They do not begin to understand what they are giving up."<br /><br /><br /><strong>Dr. Hurd</strong>: This statement represents the height of arrogance. Look at some of the premises involved in making this statement:<br /><br />Flawed Premise No. 1: The only kind of defining, irreplaceable human experience one can enjoy is having a child. <br /><br />Presumably, vigorous pursuit of one's career (or any number of other fulfilling accomplishments and/or experiences) does not count.<br /><br />Flawed Premise No. 2: "Inconvenience" is the only major reason one would not have children. <br /><br />Apparently, other reasons would not apply, such as: not being able to afford a child; having a demanding career which does not permit proper raising of a child; inability to find a romantic partner/spouse you could trust to have a child with; and various medical problems which make having a child difficult or impossible. The list of objectively valid reasons could go on and on; yet the person who wrote this letter makes it sound as if only an adolescent whim could lead one to choose childlessness. <br /><br />Flawed Premise No. 3: The choice not to have a child is automatically considered somehow wrong or neurotic. <br /><br />The burden of proof is on the childless individual for explaining why he will not have a child, rather than the other way around. All too often, parents-to-be fail to ask themselves (or their spouses) questions like: What is the nature of having a child? How up to the job am I? How ready am I to do this? Do I want to do it?<br /><br />Flawed premise No. 4: It is impossible to understand something without first-hand knowledge. <br /><br />In other words, one cannot consider one's experiences with younger siblings (including babies) while growing up; one's observations of friends/relatives who are presently raising children; one's gaining of extensive knowledge available through the media about positive and negative experiences with raising children; all the experiences related (on shows such as Oprah) by adults who grew up with parents who were not up to the job; and so forth. The premise that only first-handed knowledge can give you any level of understanding about anything is patently wrong.<br /><br /><br /><strong>Joseph Kellard</strong>: I often find the critics of the childless believe that because they have children, their lives are of greater value per se over the childless, and they dismiss the independent, individual reasons why people choose not to have kids. They condemn such people as "self-centered" or "selfish" and believe that a life without children is somehow hollow. <br /><br /><br /><strong>Dr. Hurd</strong>: People mistakenly (and sometimes resentfully) consider selfishness the primary reason -- and a bad one, at that -- for not having children. First of all, being "selfish" -- valuing your life, valuing your time, and valuing your right and responsibility to make rational choices which are objectively right for you -- is not bad. It's good, and utterly necessary, to live a self-interested life. Try to imagine five minutes of life -- especially as a parent -- without rational selfishness and the responsibility which must accompany it.<br /><br />Secondly, a child benefits far more from a selfish parent as opposed to a resentful, self-sacrificing one. A parent who has children for reasons of neurotic guilt; out of a sense of bizarre tribal duty to procreate -- or perhaps for no reason at all ("It's just the right thing to do!") -- will be an inadequate or terrible parent.<br /><br />To illustrate my point, note the contrast between selfish and selfless mentalities about having children.<br /><br />The selfless parent thinks or feels: "I don't really want to do this; or at least, I'm not sure. But I must do it. I have to take on this responsibility whether I like to or not." Exactly what kind of call to excellence can this self-imposed slavery be expected to inspire? What would you think, say, of an individual who approached bridge engineering this way? Or piloting a plane? Would you want to drive over his bridge or fly in his airplane? If not, then what kind of child do you think this sort of mentality might turn out?<br /><br />Now consider the motivation of the selfish parent: "I take this responsibility on by choice. I take it on for my own personal fulfillment, with the full understanding that the ultimate objective purpose of parenting is to help this person become independent from me. I will pursue this task not as a duty, but with the excellence I would put into any other important endeavor."<br /><br />As a child just coming into existence -- as we all were -- ask yourself this: which motivation would you prefer your parent to have?<br /><br /><br /><strong>Joseph Kellard</strong>: I also observe that the critics of the childless are almost invariably women. The worst of them probably had children, not because of any rationally selfish reasons, but, as you said, because they believed they had a duty to do so. Particularly because their families expected them to, or simply because they are female and it is considered "unnatural" not to have children and that their lives would be "incomplete" without one.<br /><br /><br /><strong>Dr. Hurd</strong>: This is likely to be true, because anyone who pushes self-sacrifice has generally endured some level of it on his/her own -- and as a consequence feels (again, with some resentment) that you should have to do the same.<br /><br />You might argue that somebody with this attitude genuinely loves having children, and therefore feels everyone should do it. Not so. When people really love what they're doing, whether it's being a parent or any other major endeavor in life, they feel no need to impose it on anyone else. They feel passionate about the job they love, but they don't expect everyone else to feel passionate about it too.<br /><br />Also, any genuinely good parent -- motivated by excellence rather than martyrdom, duty and sacrifice -- would grasp the incredible level of responsibility the comes with being a parent. They would easily see and understand that not everyone could or should be up to the job. If they're mediocre at being parents, and some part of them resents being a parent, they will more likely feel: "You should be doing this too!"<br /><br />As far as women are concerned, I suspect your generalization has some validity to it. This might be part of the "soccer mom" phenomenon we see today in politics and voting trends. According to the "soccer mom" mentality, "society" -- which in actuality means: everyone else, especially the most productive who earn the most money (and sometimes don't have children) -- should be forced, out of duty and at the point of a government gun, to pay for everyone else's child care, education, child health insurance, and all the rest. <br /><br />The practical result of this mistaken but widely held premise? Neither conservatives nor liberals can now be elected unless they subscribe to this ugly form of middle-class, mini-van socialism. Even "conservative" George W. Bush feels compelled to spend unprecedented amounts of money on public schooling and other social services, just to hold onto his fragile political base.<br /><br />With rational selfishness comes personal responsibility. With martyrdom and self-sacrifice -- the dominant psychology today -- comes a sense that everyone else must take care of you. Having children can be a wonderful, satisfying and rationally selfish experience. My experience from years of doing family counseling shows that precious few parents approach it this way.<br /><br />Because so many view parenting as a duty or sacrifice, they will sometimes feel compelled to force it onto you. "Why should I have to sacrifice?" they wail, "while you get away with not doing so?" This is the awful undertone of the person you quoted. Let's hope this sort of mentality never manages to pass a law requiring everyone to have children whether they want to or not. Given today's cultural and political trends, it's not as impossible as you may think.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1166527443008185422006-12-19T03:23:00.000-08:002006-12-19T03:24:03.020-08:00Let Me Know ... If You've Been to TahoeBy Joseph Kellard<br /><br />Well, it's official, or at least I hope my friends booked our flight. We're all heading out to Lake Tahoe for vacation in February. I had planned to go to San Diego around this time, but the person I was to stay with out there came back east, and, beside, this trip came up. I'd wanted to go with the crew when they headed out there last year, but apparently there wasn't enough room for me, the latecomer. <br /><br />Anyway, of course, I'm mainly going for the skiing/snowboarding, but in my talks with others who've been to Tahoe, there's a lot to be had out there. So far, I've heard nothing but good things, esp. about the slopes, which some people have said "blow away" Colorado; others have said the two spots are comparable. We'll, I'm going to be able to tell for myself in a few months. <br /><br />In the mean time, if you've been out to Tahoe, please email me with your impressions (theainet@optonline.net), and I'll start reading up on my destination: <br /><br />http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_TahoeAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1164626544481883262006-11-27T03:18:00.000-08:002006-11-27T03:22:24.500-08:00Sets of ‘Wonderous’ MusicBy Joseph Kellard <br /><br /><br />Wonderous Stories once played the Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” the Who’s “Tommy” and Yes’s “Close to the Edge” — all in their entirety. While that’s an unusual set for the five-piece band, performing whole albums is a trademark of Wonderous Stories, whose members further pride themselves on never practicing together or following a set list.<br /><br />At a recent show at Canno’s Swiss Tavern in Lynbrook, the band played no LPs, yet cranked out segments from Pete Townshend’s rock opera, Genesis’s “The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway” and the Beatles’ “Abbey Road.” Keyboardist Mark Bonder opened the show with the eerie wind and cathedral-like synthesizer sounds that introduce “Funeral for a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding,” as drummer Ricky Martinez did his best Elton John on lead vocals. Bonder and Martinez are two of the band’s multi-instrumental musicians, along with front man Kenny Forgione and Kevin McCann, who both sing and play guitar and bass, and lead guitarist Tommy Williams. <br /><br />Wonderous Stories’ library features many relatively obscure songs, but is peppered with enough more-familiar tunes. At Swiss Tavern, these included John’s “Honky Cat,” Traffic’s “The Low Spark of High Heeled Boys,” Pink Floyd’s “Run Like Hell,” David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” and Yes’s “Roundabout,” the latter sung by frequent guest vocalist Laura Press.<br /><br />While band members are faithful to the recorded versions, sometimes uncannily so, they still take enough liberties with the covers that express their particular styles. When, for instance, they wrapped up Emerson, Lake & Palmer’s “From the Beginning,” a light acoustic song that fades out, the band instead abruptly broke into the booming, drum-driven end of Santana’s “Oye Como Va.” Their one constant, however, is their spot-on, tight precision, a quality all the more incredible considering their disdain for rehearsals. <br /><br />“We’re able to do this because these are all songs we grew up listening to,” says Forgione, who spent his pre-Wonderous Stories days performing with McCann. <br /><br />The duo’s acoustic gigs ranged from well-known Beatles tunes to Tears for Fears-like pop songs of the day. But they also injected some personal favorites, such as classic Genesis tunes. “And we’d always have some people who would tell us, ‘I can’t believe you’re playing that stuff,’” Forgione recalls.<br /><br />In 1993, he and McCann formed a trio with Chris Clark, the band’s original keyboardist, who introduced much of the technical, intricate progressive rock like Yes. After adding a drummer, the quartet played more sets of this intense, relatively obscure music. <br /><br />The following year, Martinez, the drummer on PBS’s “Sesame Street,” replaced the band’s percussionist, and two years later Williams, the musical director for 1980s pop star Debbie Gibson, completed Wonderous Stories (named for a Yes song). More recently, Bonder has filled in when Clark has performed on Broadway. But when Bonder, Martinez and Williams joined the band, each brought more cover songs, from Pink Floyd to Steely Dan. <br /><br />The idea to play whole albums grew out of Forgione’s love of one in particular. “‘Tommy’ affected me from the time I was a kid,” says Forgione, who keeps his long brown hair in a ponytail. “When I heard it, it freaked me out. So if it did that for me, it must have done it for other people, too.” <br /><br />“All of us said, ‘Wow, this is really fascinating and challenging, let’s try to pull this off,’” Martinez remembers. <br /><br />The band first tested the waters with “Sgt. Pepper,” as Clark learned to play the difficult parts, like the strings on “She’s Leaving Home.” “People loved it,” Forgione recalls, “because not only are you playing the hits everyone knows, but also the songs that people forget about.”<br /><br />The band then played “Tommy,” a double-LP, and several other, mostly “concept” albums, including the Beatles’ “Magical Mystery Tour” and “Abbey Road” and Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” and “Dark Side of the Moon,” which they performed at Heckscher Park before some 4,000 fans this year. <br /><br />Wonderous Stories draws many fans in their 40s and 50s, but is attracting a sizable younger crowd, including college-age kids, at its gigs at venues like B.B. King Blues Club in Manhattan, Coyote Grill in Island Park, Mulcahy’s in Wantagh, Jugs-N-Strokers in Merrick and the Jones Beach boardwalk band shell, where 3,000-plus fans showed up for a show at summer’s end. <br /><br />Williams, who grew up in Merrick listening to the Beatles, Cream, Yes and Genesis when disco and punk were the rage, is surprised and heartened when younger fans sing back to them every lyric of every song, even the obscure ones, from any random album they play. He sees this as their yearning for the album era. <br /><br />“With the advent of downloading, very few people download a whole album — they mostly take a song or two from many different albums,” Williams said between sets at the Swiss Tavern gig. “So the idea of an album as an entity that you listen to, it’s become like an aging bottle of wine. It's much cooler to get one of those now.”<br /><br />The band opened its second set with a medley of vintage Genesis songs, including “Watcher of the Skies,” then it plunged into the overture to “Tommy.” From there it tackled “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” from Abbey Road, one of several requests from the crowd. <br /><br />Some audience members asked for a few Doors songs. Before embarking on “Break on Through,” McCann, bass in hand, tells his band mates he has never played the song before. Williams walks him through the chord progression, then turns to Martinez. “Do you know it?” he asks the drummer. <br /><br />“Sort of,” Martinez says — and the band proceeds to play the tune as if they’d been doing it for years. <br /><br /><br /><em>To learn more about Wonderous Stories, visit the band's Web site at www.wonderous-stories.com</em>.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1164422526657936302006-11-24T18:41:00.000-08:002006-11-24T18:42:06.656-08:00Get Your "Letting Go of God" CDFrom Joseph Kellard<br /> <br />Julia Sweeney has finally released the CD of her one-woman act, "Letting Go of God"<br /> <br />http://tinyurl.com/wsrnq<br /> <br />The website provides some excerpts from the CD, along with passages from the accompanying booklet of Sweeney's entire monologue.<br /> <br />At the recommendation of some HBLers, including Harry Binswanger, I went to see Sweeney's play in Manhattan earlier this year. I enjoyed it immensely. <br /> <br />As Harry wrote in his HBL review back in February 2005: "This play is a unique combination of the light and entertaining with the thoughtful and profound. It begins with Julia Sweeney's early devotion to Catholicism, and as the play continues, we see issues from within the author's mental frame at that stage of her development. So at the beginning we are told, in monologue, how wonderful Catholicism is, how inspiring, what role models nuns are(!).<br /> <br />"But Julia Sweeney wouldn't stop thinking--i.e., asking questions.<br />And each question answered pried her a little farther from religion."American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1164422044251172862006-11-24T18:32:00.000-08:002006-11-24T18:34:04.263-08:00Jefferson vs. Lincoln as Most InfluentialHere is a letter I wrote and emailed to The Atlantic. My letter pertains, not to what I previously posted about regarding the magazine’s discussion of Howard Roark, but to the actual top 100 list itself (see http://tinyurl.com/yymfej). Specifically, my letter targets TA’s placing of Abraham Lincoln at the top, above Thomas Jefferson, as the most influential American ever. <br /><br /><br />To the Editor,<br /><br />That Abraham Lincoln tops your list of all-time most influential Americans, particularly above a political prime mover such as Thomas Jefferson, indicates how modern historians shun fundamental values. <br /><br />True, Lincoln abolished slavery and saved the Union, but what exactly did he save? Well, the freest nation in history -- which Jefferson made possible. For the first time, Jefferson and his fellow founders establishment a nation based on the ideas of “All men are created equal” and “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” -- that is, that each individual, despite such non-essential characteristics as race, has an inherent right to these values. <br /><br />Yes, some founders like Jefferson owned slaves, but slavery had previously been practiced in virtually every culture throughout history. What’s most important about the founders is that they were the vital bridge between the old world and a new, enlightened, freer one, influencing men away from the dogmas that your life belongs to Gods, kings or tribal groups, to the object fact that each individual has sovereignty over his own life. In short, Jefferson and the founders established a unique nation that remains the most influential beacon of freedom and life ever. <br /><br />Without the ideas that Jefferson championed, there would have been no Civil War, since men would still have been without the moral and political grounds on which to seriously oppose slavery. Hell, there likely wouldn’t have even been a Union for Lincoln to have saved. <br /><br /><br />Joseph Kellard<br /><br /><br />You can email your own letter to The Atlantic at: Letters@theatlantic.comAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1164301391128272482006-11-23T09:01:00.000-08:002006-11-23T09:03:11.143-08:00The Atlantic Attacks EgoismBy Joseph Kellard<br /><br />"The 100 Most Influential Americans of All Time." Thus reads the<br />headline on the cover of the December issue of The Atlantic<br /><br />http://www.theatlantic.com/<br /><br />I curiously flipped through this magazine's pages and found that<br />Abraham Lincoln tops the list, according to a group of modern<br />historians. The article also contains sidebars of other influential<br />Americans, runners-up from poets to musicians to architects. And,<br />to my surprise, one architect listed, alongside Frank Lloyd Wright,<br />is Howard Roark.<br /><br />TA notes that Roark is fictional, but that Ayn Rand's character was<br />nonetheless very influential. Well, that's good, right? But wait!<br />"Influential," like the word "controversial," doesn't necessarily<br />connote something positive. I mean, when Abraham Lincoln is<br />listed above such political prime movers as Thomas Jefferson and<br />George Washington--since he saved the Union that TJ and GW<br />otherwise established--then these historians obviously have their<br />priorities (or hierarchies) screwed up. And so there's a good chance<br />this mention of Roark will be negative. Well, my suspicions were<br />right, particularly after I read The Atlantic's awful summation of<br />Roark's character.<br /><br />Turns out, according to The Atlantic, Roark is responsible for<br />influencing some of today's worst architects, who go unnamed.<br />Specifically, it's Roark's egoism that is responsible for these<br />reprehensible moderns. Yep, the hero of The Fountainhead was<br />"influential" alright, but primarily for promoting such despicable<br />things as individualism and selfishness.<br /><br />Recall that this is the magazine (also known as Atlantic Monthly) that<br />once featured the essay "Thomas Jefferson: Radical or Racist," by<br />Conor Cruise O'Brien, in which the author of the Declaration of<br />Independence was attacked as a radical <em>and </em>racist, and described<br />as the spiritual father of the Ku Klux Klan, Timothy McVeigh and<br />the modern militia movement, according to Robert Tracinski (see<br />TIA July 1997).<br /><br />Jefferson did make the top five on The Atlantic's list, since he<br />wrote those all-important political words: "All men are created<br />equal." Certainly these are important words. But consider that The<br />Atlantic is a leftist magazine, and so these words can, and have<br />been, twisted to mean that all men are created to possess equality of<br />results, needs, values--not that they all equally have the liberty to<br />"pursue" their own happiness. No, that would be individualistic and<br />selfish.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1163817659316482762006-11-17T18:39:00.000-08:002006-11-17T18:40:59.333-08:00ObsessionWatch this 12-minute clip on militant Islam: <br /><br />http://www.obsessionthemovie.com/12min.htmAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1162984887975658872006-11-08T03:13:00.000-08:002006-11-08T03:21:27.976-08:00How I VotedHere in New York, I voted mostly for Democrats, including Hillary. I could not have imagined doing that just a few short years ago, not to mention throughout the second half of the 1990s. But such is the state of the Republicans, who are as dreadful, if not worse, than the Dems. From what I know, the Dems picked up some seats in the Senate, but not enough for a majority, and they'll have the majority in the House. <br /><br />So, it looks like we'll get exactly what I'd hoped for: gridlock, with neither the Dems nor Repubs having enough of a mandate to affect much or any of their real nasty, rights- and life-destroying causes. So long as those two animals, who share the same fundamental philosophy, continue to be at each others throats for the next few years, neither will do anything drastic, and we Objectivists will simply have more time to spread our philosophy throughout this country’s educational system (an effort that is growing considerably now) for a better tomorrow. <br /><br />I mention that I voted “mostly” for the Dems. I did vote for one Republican, the forgettable Fasso, who ran against Evil Spitzer. I simply could not cast my vote for such a thug of a candidate.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1161136555156196082006-10-17T18:49:00.000-07:002006-10-17T18:55:55.176-07:00Integrated Eye for the Confident Guy<em>I’ve had little motivation to write any commentary lately, focusing instead on other important pursuits (wink & smile). So, until I find that motivation, which I expect will return the more I satisfy other pleasures in life that need ... satisfying, I plan to post some of my past writings instead. Here’s a commentary I wrote back in January 2004, one that Dr. Michael Hurd liked enough to reprint in his Living Resources Newsletter (Vol. 11 No. 2). Enjoy!</em><br /><br />Integrated Eye for the Confident Guy<br />By Joseph Kellard<br /><br /><br />Bravo’s “Queer Eye for the Straight Guy” features five homosexual men who makeover heterosexual guys. The show is popular, however, not primarily because of its gay-straight dynamic, but because it promotes an important value rarely practiced today. <br /><br />In each episode the “Fab Five” visit their subject at his home and upgrade his choices in clothing, grooming, interior design, dining and culture. Before arriving, they go over his bio and discuss his reasons for seeking a makeover. Past subjects have included pack rats, longhaired throwbacks from decades past, inept dancers, the overweight, and an overalls-wearer. Their goals have been to become more independent, to ask a girlfriend to move in, to rekindle a 20-year-plus marriage, and to rejoin the dating scene. <br /><br />The Fab Five approach each makeover with serious, calculated thought, always mindful of each guy’s individual goals, personality, and manner of living. They share with us their thought processes and methods as they assist their subject in picking the appropriate threads, skin products, furniture, food and wine, or music. <br /><br />For example, we watch Carson rummage through each guy’s closet and determine he must update his wardrobe and add brighter hues (“colors show confidence,” the fashion expert often states). Carson tailors the new clothesline accordingly, whether his subject is a Marine or a rocker he fits with rugged yet stylish looks, or an already model-like guy who he suggests wears “always elegant” black-and-white attire to propose to his girlfriend. <br /><br />Thom, the interior designer, learns about how each guy uses his living quarters, and with modern furniture, rugs and paints he creates for him the appropriate space and ambiance. Thom often employs the standard decorating principle that uses colors from a single object, such as a lamp or bedspread, to play off the same tones he paints the walls. <br /><br />Stylist extraordinaire, Kyan explains the various skin and hair products he expects his subject to use to achieve a cleaner, healthy appearance. He meticulously demonstrates to each guy the manner in which he should groom, explaining, for instance, such shaving principles as stroking slowly and with the grain. <br /><br />While these experts take serious life’s finer but nonetheless important details, they are incredibly humorous (though sometimes sophomoric), witty and upbeat as they go about their business. They thereby send the message that, far from being a burden, remaking oneself and maintaining the new look can and should be enjoyable, uplifting and self-fulfilling.<br /><br />The Fab Five often note the confidence that the makeovers give their subjects. But this confidence reflects a deeper self-esteem that originally sparked each guy’s desire for self-improvement. And such factors tie into what makes QE a hit. <br /><br />QE’s makeovers focus, not merely on an individual’s immediate appearance, such as his clothes and hair, but on broader, important details, from the furniture he surrounds himself with to the brand of wine he picks for a special dinner. Thus, while the show evokes style, sophistication, elegance, and manners, it above all promotes the idea that it is important to have each aspect of your life reflect your goals, personality and lifestyle. The primary value QE promotes is that this all-encompassing integration leads to a better, improved person who assumes a positive, confident approach toward his life.<br /><br />As Carson says in a tip he offers at the end of one episode, “Travel with luggage that represents your lifestyle. That way, everything that says ‘you’ from head to toe, travels in something that says you.” <br /><br />Unfortunately, both critics and fans of QE emphasize instead its gay-straight dynamic. Some critics crow that it promotes “stereotypes” of homosexuals --that all that gays think about is mousse and Gucci wears. The Fab Five, however, are intelligent sophisticates who project no such superficiality. This fact, in part, prompts some QE fans to see the show mainly as a vehicle to make Americans more “tolerant” of gays.<br /><br />While the gay-straight dynamic does lend an interesting, sometimes thought-provoking social element to the show, QE is essentially about aesthetically-minded men with an eye for transforming an individual into a more complete, integrated person for his betterment. <br /><br />Encouragingly, an appreciation for these high-minded values, too rare in America today, is the silent motor driving this show’s success. QE embodies a manner of broader, integrated thinking about one’s life that many individuals -- gays and straights, women and men alike -- fail to adopt, yet know it would benefit them greatly.<br /><br /><br />Copyright © 2004 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1159927643884994482006-10-03T19:02:00.000-07:002006-10-03T19:07:23.896-07:00My Writings on Cap MagThanks to Gus Van Horn, who runs an exceptional Objectivist blog(http://gusvanhorn.blogspot.com/), I learned that Capitalism Magazine lists three pages of my columns, essays and articles that have been posted on its website over several years: http://www.capmag.com/author.asp?name=32<br /><br />These pieces have appeared in many places, including my now defunct newsletter, Axiom3, and my original website called The American Individualist, as well as the Herald newspapers (which employee me) and some prominent paper, such as the Washington Times, and the book “Grow Up, America!” by psychologist Michael Hurd. <br /><br />Cap Mag lists my pieces in chronological order instead of by category, but note that I’ve written on a wide-variety of issues and subjects, from the war, sports, art, books, movies, “reality” TV, obesity and defense attorneys, to my mother, Ritalin, Bill Clinton and feminism, ESPN, Independence Day, Dan Marino and Leonardo da Vinci. The following is a list of my favorite writings from the Cap Mag list, the ones with asterisks being my top favorites. <br /><br /><br />$ Sept 11th: An Attack On Our Values (September 5, 2006)<br /><br />* My Mom's Invaluable Lesson (May 14, 2006)<br /><br />$ An Open Letter to Dan Marino (August 7, 2005)<br /><br />$ Red Holocaust (May 30, 2004)<br /><br />* Pat Tillman: Fighting For His Self-Interest (May 29, 2004)<br /><br />* "The Passion" of Howard Roark (April 10, 2004)<br /><br />$ What Makes the Super Bowl "Super" (February 4, 2004)<br /><br />* An Open Letter to ESPN on Rush Limbaugh (October 8, 2003)<br /><br />* Conservatives for the Separation of God and Religion (April 18, 2003)<br /><br />$ In Praise of Obesity (February 23, 2003)<br /><br />$ Martin Luther King's Dream vs. Hillary Clinton's Nightmare (February 8, 2003)<br /><br />$ The Impoverished Values of "Joe Millionaire" (January 30, 2003)<br /><br />$ Thankful to Be American (November 25, 2002)<br /><br />$ The Guilt of Defense Attorneys (September 8, 2002)<br /><br />* Patriots Taxed by Taxes (March 3, 2002)<br /><br />$ Sports = Life (November 5, 2001)<br /><br />$ "The Sopranos" is Fired At for the Wrong Reasons (June 3, 2001)<br /><br />$ Get Busy Living, or Get Busy Dying: A Review of "The Shawshank Redemption" (July 17, 2000)<br /><br />* The Meaning of Independence Day (July 4, 2000)<br /><br />$ Traditionalism vs. Defiance: A Review of "Billy Elliot" (January 28, 2000)<br /><br />$ A Double Standard of Hypocrisy: Feminism's Love Affair with President Clinton (February 4, 1999)<br /><br />$ Public Education's Escape Through ADD and Ritalin (January 31, 1999)<br /><br />$ Feeding fuel to a fire: Clinton's attempt to fight racism by enshrining it (December 31, 1998)<br /><br />* Leonardo da Vinci: Renaissance Man Extraordinaire (November 8, 1998)American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1159007901862045162006-09-23T03:37:00.000-07:002006-09-23T03:38:21.866-07:00Life is GoodWhile I love warm and hot weather (and detest the cold with each passing frigid winter), I’ve designated autumn my favorite time of year, and not just for the cozy fleeces and fireplace blazes its chilly weather inspires.<br /><br />To be more specific, September and October are my favorite months because of all the many things I find myself doing this time of year. First and foremost, September marks the start of the football season, both professional and collegiate. Of course, football is my favorite sports, for reasons I’ve written about several times (write me if you’d like to read some of my football-lauding columns), and this usually draws me to a local restaurant-bar to watch my favorite team, the Miami Dolphins, on satellite. Alas, my Dolphins aren’t winning so far this season, but the faithful, of which I am one, still have some hope they can turn things around. Most of all, I just really enjoy going to social scene at the restaurant-bar, meeting up with fellow football fans, friends and coworkers each Sunday. <br /><br />September also marks the start of the Ayn Rand Institute-sponsored lecture series at New York University. These ARI lectures usually draw some sizable crowds, and I always leave each one feeling there’s some hope left in our world, hope that the good and just can and will ultimately prevail. A friend and I just went to see the kickoff lecture of the series, John Lewis’s talk on the five-year aftermath of Sept. 2001 (from which I learned a lot about imperialist Japan of World War II). Of course, Lewis’s lecture was great, and afterward me and my friend enjoyed some the best pizza you’ll find anywhere on earth at a parlor on Bleecker Street. Kara, the president of NYU’s Objectivist Club, says the club plans a number of lectures this school year. Something to look forward to right into spring.<br /><br />A week prior to Lewis’s talk this past Wednesday, art historian Lee Sandstead gave a lecture on his favorite works of art, called “What They Mean to Mean.” I took notes and was going to write an article on this lecture, but I’m holding off since I may attend a private tour of the Metropolitan Museum that Lee is supposed to give on ancient Greek art this weekend. Also, when I take a much-needed week-long vacation in October, I will attend a tour he plans to give on stained glass, certainly a totally new subject for me. Part of what’s great about Lee is that he can make what seems like a dull subject into something very interesting and informative. So, I may wait until I attend all of these events to write something about Lee, whose obvious passion for art rubs off on me in ways I cannot accurately describe here and now. Perhaps if and when I write an article on him and his art tours I can capture this passion and do it justice. <br /><br />Meanwhile, in early October, during my vacation, I also intend to go on the “heroes” hike that I’ve been doing for a few years now with other fellow Ayn Rand fans, or, to be more specific, Andrew Bernstein fans, since this bi-annual hike was originally inspired by his novel “Heart of a Pagan.” There’s a scene in the novel in which the hero, a extraordinary college basketball player named Swoop, gets fellow students, teammates and fans to accompany him to a mountain top and profess what they are most proud of about their lives, their achievements and such. This is a counter to the churches’ confessionals, where people go beg forgiveness for their “sins.” So each spring and fall we “Heart of a Pagan” fans climb to the top of Breakneck Ridge along the Hudson, starting in a small town call Cold Spring in upstate New York, and do same. Come join us to express your pride. <br /><br />Later in the month, I’ll be attending a journalism conference here on Long Island, with I hope that I can expand my horizons a bit, by networking with those in my field and discovering what options are out there for me. This will be my first such conference, so I’m eager to attend it and meet others in various fields of journalism, from top newspapers and television networks on down.<br /><br />Near October’s end, I’ll head up to Boston with a friend to attend the Objectivist Conference-sponsored lecture series “Jihad Against the West,” in which Objectivists from Yaron Brook, Peter Schwartz and John Lewis will give various talks alongside non-Objectivists such as Daniel Pipes and Robert Spencer, the latter of whom made a documentary on the deadly threat posed by Islam. It’s a three day event culminating with Brook giving the key lecture at the Ford Hall Forum at Northeastern University. I always love going to Boston (one of my favorite cities), and love it even more when I go to see Objectivist lecturers before large crowds.<br /><br />http://www.objectivistconferences.com/fordhall06/schedule.htm<br /><br /><br />Julia Sweeney, who played the androgynous character Pat on Saturday Night Live, will return to New York City with her one-woman play, Letting Go of God, in mid October. I plan to go to one of her shows. I saw the play earlier this year and highly recommend it. It’s a great exposition on how an average, everyday person comes to questions God and sees the irrationalities and contradictions in religion, and eventually turns toward secularism. Better yet, Sweeney has a book and CD coming out based on her play, and at her invitation I’m on a list to be among the first 500 people to receive (and review?) them. Well, I already know the play is great, so the book and CD can’t be much different. Anyway, nothing compares to going to see Sweeney in her one-act play, so go see it. <br /><br />http://www.juliasweeney.com/welcome.asp<br /><br /><br />Also, on Halloween night, a friend and I will trek to Madison Square Garden to see Dweezil Zappa, Steve Vie, Terry Bozzio team up to play Frank Zappa’s tunes at the Theater, formerly the Felt Forum, where Zappa put on a show every Halloween night. This promises to be loads of fun, since I don’t go to see many concerts anymore and few at MSG. <br /><br />Lastly, I’ll be going to see my favorite cover band, Wonderous Stories -- which, on a good night, plays covers of Yes, one of my favorite rock bands -- perform at a few Long Island Bars next week and in October. I hope to write a story on them for the papers I work for. Wonderous Stories did so well in its concert series this summer, drawing some pretty considerable crowds at various parks, that they were invited to play Jones Beach Theater. They’re a great cover band of what are essentially studio musicians.<br /><br />http://www.wonderous-stories.com/v2/schedule.php<br /><br /><br />Oh, yeah, one more thing, since I’m spoke of work: on top of all of this, I just got a pretty nice raise at work. What better way to celebrate and spend my millions than on all these various events and activities over the next few weeks, and hopefully many more in coming months. <br /><br />Life is good. <br /><br />~ Joe KellardAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1157758423200929512006-09-08T16:28:00.000-07:002006-09-08T16:33:43.213-07:00America Attacked for Her ValuesBy Joseph Kellard<br />September 8, 2006<br /><br /><br /><em>This column was first published in the Oceanside/Island Park Herald after September 11, 2001. I've reprinted it (with some minor revisions), on the eve of the fifth anniversary of that blackest day in our nation's history, as a reminder of the fundamental nature of America and her enemies.<br /></em><br /><br />One day as I drove down Lexington Avenue, I understood the reverence author-philosopher Ayn Rand had for New York City. <br /><br />From an incline along that avenue, a vantage point from which I'd never before seen Manhattan, I was awed by the many tall, stately buildings that lined the perfectly straight street for miles. Finally I’d had grasped how this scene, which resembled a canyon, and the entire metropolis had sprung not from nature, but from the human mind.<br /><br />I was reminded of a passage from Rand's novel "The Fountainhead": "I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of New York's skyline. Particularly when one can't see the details. Just the shapes. The shapes and the thought that made them. The sky over New York and the will of man made visible. What other religion do we need?"<br /><br />On Sept. 11, 2001, after I'd watched Islamic terrorists destroy the twin towers and the innocent people in them, I was reminded of what Rand also wrote about evil: "They do not want to own your fortune, they want you to lose it; they do not want to succeed; they want you to fail; they do not want to live, they want you to die; they desire nothing, they hate existence ... You who've never grasped the nature of evil, you who describe them as 'misguided idealists,’ they are the essence of evil."<br /><br />This passage from "Atlas Shrugged" serves to answer people bewildered over how human beings can act so savagely. At root, the Islamic terrorists are motivated by nihilism, the desire to destroy all values and existence. And they understood that the skyscraper is uniquely American.<br /><br />Because of our nation's unprecedented liberties, Americans were free to form independent judgments and act on them. This environment spawned the Industrial Revolution, which saw great technological advances and labor-saving devices, such as the steel girders and elevators that made skyscrapers possible. More specifically, the twin towers embodied capitalism, whose foundation -- the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- spawned America's unsurpassed prosperity. <br /><br />Those gleaming, soaring, stately towers were a proud boast of all these sublime human values and achievements. And this is why the religious nihilists twice targeted them. More specifically, they targeted the towers’ source: the liberated human mind. Militant Islamics don't want America's freedom, its industriousness, its technological advances, its high standard of living -- nor its skyscrapers. They only want us to lose them through their destructive acts.<br /><br />This upcoming war is between America and Islamic fundamentalists. In essence, Americans use reason to choose their values and actions; the terrorists have blind faith in Allah’s word. We value freedom; they value religious totalitarianism. We value the individual; they force the individual to submit and sacrifice to their religious dogma. We pursue and achieve happiness here on earth; they damn this world and martyr themselves for an alleged afterworld.<br /><br />At root, we want life and they want death. (As a Taliban spokesman put it, "Americans want to live; but we Muslims are willing to die for our beliefs.") Our leaders should give the death-worshiping terrorists what they want, in part, as an act of justice for we Americans who want to live.<br /><br /><br />Copyright © 2006 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1157291972105613762006-09-03T06:57:00.000-07:002006-09-03T06:59:32.110-07:00A Jewel of a DiamondBy Joseph Kellard<br />September 3, 2006<br /><br /><br />Every few years I drive by Wrights Field, a Little League diamond in Oceanside, for a dose of nostalgia. In recent years, I noticed that thefield had fallen into some disrepair, but during a trip down memory lane this summer, I found a new chain-link fence had been installed, doors repainted and the outfield furnished with foul poles and other attractive additions. This suggested that, for now, an Oceanside landmark will survive.<br /><br />For me, playing on that ball field while growing up in the late 1970swas something special. Previously, I had played on Flushing fields marred with patchy, overgrown grass, dusty dirt, rusted backstops and dried-up water fountains. When my family and I moved to Oceanside, I started playing Double A ball on School 4's fields, which had no outfield fences or dugouts, and parents stood or sat in lawn chairs along the bleacher-less foul lines.<br /><br />Wrights Field, however, which was reserved for the older kids in adivision then known as the Majors, made you feel as if you were playing Major League Baseball. First, it was the only ball field in town with a designated name, like Wrigley Field, and with good reason. Wrights Field was a well-manicured, lush green diamond with an outfield fence, dugouts, bleachers, an electric scoreboard, a concession booth, men's and women's bathrooms, lights for night games and a P.A. system that blared your name tothe crowd when you stepped in the batter's box.<br /><br />While other fields in Oceanside and neighboring towns had some of these features, none was the complete package like Wrights Field, a mini-ball park nestled along a canal lined with attractive homes and boats.<br /><br />During my pre-Wrights Field playing days, I often practiced by swinging a wiffle ball bat at a tennis or sponge ball in my fenced-in yard, where I had used the front stoop as first base, a tree as second and the mailbox as third. Those were the years when Cincinnati's "Big Red Machine" steamrolled over teams, Hank Aaron was wrapping up his illustrious career, the "Bronx Zoo" Yankees were winning World Series and the “Bad News Bears” movies werethe rage.<br /><br />Ever the imaginative kid, I would create exciting scenarios in which Ialways came through in the clutch. While my baseball idols were greats like Reggie Jackson, Pete Rose and Rod Carew, I never pretended to be them. I was always myself, a power hitter who only had to routinely swat the ball over my chain-linked fence 15 yards away into a neighbor's yard to be their equal and MVP. And always in my head the Phil Rizzuto-like sports announcer or cheering crowd praised and applauded my heroics.<br /><br />In reality, when I finally got to dig my cleats into Wrights Field withthe Lions Club, I wasn't even the best on my team, but I held my own. I was a versatile player who could strike out sluggers on the mound, chase down grounders at second base and shortstop and throw out base runners from behind the plate. Exploiting my best asset, my Jose Reyes-like speed, I robbed many batters of doubles and triples, dashing and diving for line drives in the outfield, and I even smacked a few inside-the-park home runs.<br /><br />While playing at Wrights Field, I also got to taste championship status, helping the Lions Club take the National League title in 1977. Of course, my dream was to one day win a World Series with the Bronx Bombers at Yankee Stadium. Playing with the Lions Club at Wrights Field, however, was as close as I'd come.<br /><br />At least I can say I played on a jewel of a Little League diamond before some sizable crowds. For me, Wrights Field will perhaps remain the spot in Oceanside that holds some of my best memories. I'm happy to see it's been upgraded, and hope to be able to return there five to 50 years from now for my nostalgia fix.<br /><br /><br />Copyright © 2006 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1154997318646575762006-08-07T17:33:00.000-07:002006-08-07T17:35:18.650-07:00End the Cycle of Militant Islam's AggressionBy Joseph Kellard<br />August 7, 2006<br /><br /><br />Israel's enemies are once again at war with her. Today the enemy is Hezbollah, an Iranian-sponsored terrorist organization whose stated goal is to annihilate Israel. But whether it's Hezbollah, Hamas or the Palestinians wagging war on Israel, you are their accomplice who call these continuous conflicts a “cycle of violence," condemns Israel for its "disproportionate" response, and clamor for a "ceasefire."<br /><br />All these reactions are interrelated and illustrate why Israel's death-worshipping enemies survive to relentlessly wage war on the only free, Western nation in that region -- the fundamental reason they want to annihilate Israel.<br /><br />When people talk of a "cycle of violence" between Israelis and their Muslim enemies, ask them what they mean by "violence." This broad word denotes the use of physical force to injure or kill someone else. But there are two distinct forms of violence: the <em>initiation</em> of force and the <em>retaliatory</em> use of force. To initiate violence against others, such as rape, assault or murder, is evil. And once a brute initiates violence, his victim has the unequivocal right to fight back, to protect himself by stopping, evading andperhaps killing his would-be rapist or murderer. Such violence is good; an act of justice.<br /><br />The same holds true for free nations. Since its establishment, Israel has been attacked by its Muslim neighbors, who have always been the aggressors when "violence" has broken out there. So, the actual cycle involves Muslims initiating force against an essentially free nation, while Israel responds with retaliatory force to stop this aggressive violence.<br /><br />To call these circumstances a "cycle of violence" is to package together complete opposite forms of violence, wipe out their crucial, life-and-death distinctions, and put Israel on a par with her murderous enemies. Instead, Israel must stamp out militant Islam's cycle of aggression against her, and must do this immediately by crushing all her enemies with whatever force is necessary. <br /><br />This is why we should condemn those who condemn Israel's response to Hezbollah's initial aggression of kidnappings and missile fire as "disproportionate." Actually, Israel isn't being nearly disproportionate enough in its military campaign in Lebanon.<br /><br />When an aggressor murderously attacks a free nation, that nation has a moral obligation to try to crush this enemy; anything less is a disproportionate response. So just as the United States was attacked at Pearl Harbor and responded with a retaliatory force that eventually decimated two of Japan's cities and lead to the aggressive imperialist regime's ultimate surrender, and just as General Sherman responded to the Confederacy igniting the Civil War by devastating the South, so too must Israel respond with the force necessary to annihilate Hezbollah. And any and all civilian casualties, in Israel and Lebanon, are on Hezbollah's head.<br /><br />But instead Israel continues to tie its hands behind its back, by pulling its punches to avoid enemy civilian casualties, by merely attempting to destroy the enemy's infrastructure instead of its regime and supporters, by negotiating with her would-be annihilators, by conceding more land to them that she rightfully occupied after past aggressions. All of these appeasing steps only sacrifice Israel and her interests, her right to survive as a free nation, and permit her potential killers to live for another day.<br /><br />This vicious cycle starts with calls for "a ceasefire." Once Israel shows she is militarily able to defeat her enemies, her foes inevitably call for "a ceasefire.” And Israel foolishly accepts these ceasefires on the pretext that her enemies will abide by their conditions. But murderous aggressors can never be trusted to uphold anything. In short, the ceasefires simply buys the aggressors more time to regroup and plan their next attacks, as they've done now for decades.<br />Yet crushing Hezbollah, Hamas and the Palestinians, and thereby decisively showing where their death-worshipping ideology leads -- just as the U.S. showed the Nazis that their evil ideas end in *their* death and destruction -- is not the ultimate solution for Israel’s survival, safety and peace. These and other Muslim groups are mere heads of the main hydra in militant Islam's war against the West, the theocracy of Iran.<br /><br />Iran remains the world's premier sponsor of anti-Western terrorism, and its regime's main targets is the U.S. and Israel. This is made crystal clear by Iran's threats to wipe Israel off the map and its emblazoning the words "Death to Israel" and "Death to America" on its missiles, which the regime is working feverishly to furnish with nuclear heads.<br /><br />To protect ourselves and finally end militant Islam's decades-long war against the West, America and Israel must immediately and decisively eliminate the source of this threat by destroying Iran's terror-sponsoring mullahs and ayatollahs and their supporters. Nothing less will do.<br /><br /><br />Copyright © 2006 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1153689789810743802006-07-23T14:20:00.000-07:002006-07-23T14:23:09.826-07:00Letter to Editors: Crush Iran Into Surrender* <em>I wrote and sent the following letter to the New York Sun, and a slightly different version to such prominent papers as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New York Post , Washington Times, USA Today and Newsday</em>.<br /><br /><br />To the Editor,<br />(Re: “Santorum: Time To Get Tough With Iran,” by Ira Stoll, July 21-23) Rick Santorum correctly identifies our enemy as militant Islamics whose ideological and military center is Iran, and draws relevant parallels between their war on America to fascist Germany and World War II. Thus he is dead wrong not to propose military strikes against Iran. <br /><br />Since, like the Nazis, Iran is bent on America’s destruction, than we must now use whatever military force is needed to destroy Tehran’s global terror regime, just as we did with Berlin’s Third Reich. The crucial lesson such devastation would teach militant Islamics worldwide is exactly what the Nazis learned: your ideology leads to your demise.<br /><br />Santorum’s solution of supporting Iranian dissidents -- especially as their oppressive theocrats inch closer to wielding nuclear weapons -- is too late. Iran has waged war against the U.S. since taking Americans hostage in 1979. Its terrorist regime then bombed our military bases in Beirut in 1983 and Saudi Arabia in 1996, and sends proxies into battle against America and her allies in Iraq, Lebanon and Gaza today.<br /><br />The more our so-called leaders evade a military policy to crush Iran into surrender, the more U.S. troops in the Middle East and potentially millions of Americans at home will perish at the hands of Iranian-backed killers.<br /><br />Joseph KellardAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1153190438579140512006-07-17T19:36:00.000-07:002006-07-17T19:40:38.580-07:00Insults & Free SpeechBy Joseph Kellard<br /><br />The New York Sun reports on July 13 that the Turkish government may jail a novelist because she supposedly “insulted Turkishness.” The government tried to prosecute this novelist, Elif Shafak, in June on the same outlandish Turkish criminal code that prohibits denigration of any aspect of Turkish culture. The charges were dropped after a prosecutor argued that “the book is a work of fiction and therefore does not represent the view of the author,” according to the Sun. But a higher court overruled this decision following complaints from a group of nationalist lawyers.<br /><br />Both Shafak and her publisher speculate that the alleged “anti-Turkish” part of her novel concerns comments a character makes about the Turkish massacre of 1.5 million Armenians in 1915. In recent decades, the Turkish government has denied the massacre took place.<br /><br />Meanwhile, PEN, an “artistic rights” organization, defends Shafak on the same awful grounds as the aforementioned prosecutor, that is, “Writers shouldn’t be held responsible for what their characters say and do,” a PEN director said.<br /><br />Actually, a novelist who creates a fictional character <em>is responsible</em> for whatever that character says and does. She is responsible for her character’s views, since the character is her creation, just as Ayn Rand was responsible for creating Ellsworth Toohey. But all of this is irrelevant to the fundamental issue involved in this case. That is, like the Danish cartoonists who depicted Mohammad wearing a bomb for a turban, Shafak has the right to write whatever she wants, insults or otherwise, and whether or not they are her views. If what she writes insults others, this violates no one’s rights, but to prosecute her for this reason violates her right to free speech.<br /><br />Those who ignore or evade these fundamental facts must then scramble for rationalizations, like arguing that a novelist who creates a character is not responsible for that creation. Instead of condemning the Turkish court for violating Shafak’s right to free speech, and upholding that right, PEN tries to deny that the novelist is responsible for creating an “anti-Turkish” character, in a fruitless attempt to distance her from any connection to violating an elastic, irrational standard: denigrating Turkish culture.<br /><br />Like the feeble, so-called defenders of the Danish cartoonists, PEN needs a primer on why free speech is an absolute. Meanwhile, chalk up another strike against this fundamental right, at least in Turkey.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1152876013394861052006-07-14T04:19:00.000-07:002006-07-14T04:20:13.406-07:00Email to President Bush on Iran*<em> I sent President Bush the following email as Iran heightens its war against Israel -- and by extension the United States. The emails almost certainly never get to the hands of the president, but they are read by his staff and the issues and ideas people write about most, in some form, trickle down to him. You can email the president at</em>: <a href="mailto:president@whitehouse.gov">president@whitehouse.gov</a>.<br /><br />President Bush,<br /><br />When are you going to finally destroy the terrorist-sponsoring regime in Iran? This is the only reason I voted for you in 2004. Post-9/11 you said you would end states that sponsor anti-American and anti-Western terrorism, Iran has for decades been the premier terrorist state, and the Iranians are openly demonstrating this fact in Iraq, Israel, Lebanon and Gaza today. So what are you waiting for? Are you waiting for Iran to get nukes and use them?<br /><br />You’d better immediately drop what you should never have started -- that is, diplomatic concessions and (attempted) talks with Iran -- and get down to all-out military action against the mullahs and ayatollahs. Otherwise, you have failed completely on what your presidency is based on most: protecting the American people, including U.S. soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan, from our would-be destroyers.<br /><br />Joseph KellardAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1152181770922576972006-07-06T03:25:00.000-07:002006-07-06T03:29:30.926-07:00Anne of Green GablesBy Joseph Kellard<br />July 6, 2006<br /><br /><br /><a name="115209823455865105"></a>On the high praise from Lisa VanDamme, I read, enjoyed and recommend L.M. Montgomery’s “Anne of Green Gables.” This is VanDamme’s favorite children’s novel, about which she writes (in her essay “The Hierarchy of Knowledge” from the inaugural issue of T<em>he Objective Standard</em>): “Anne, the main character, has a passionate, independent spirit that makes a lasting impression on children and adults alike. Her adventures are delightful to every child, and the theme of the novel, which concerns the importance of pursuing your values with passion, is one that children can understand.”<br /><br />I concur and recommend this novel to anyone for them to simply contemplate a child with an exuberant enthusiasm, that is, the benevolent spirit Ayn Rand encourages her readers to cherish and foster throughout their lives.<br /><br />Siblings and farmers Matthew and Marillia Cuthbert adopt Anne Shirley, a romantically imaginative, ambitious, talkative young orphan. From there the novel takes us through Anne’s various interactions and relationships with her parents, peers and fellow townspeople as she learns various lessons of life. Yet Anne provides the best lesson of all, being an exemplar of how to love life, to be endlessly curious about all it has to offer, and to have and passionately pursue values and goals.<br /><br />(Plot spoilers ahead.)<br /><br />From early on Anne states her goals, the highest being to wear nice clothes (esp. dresses with puffy sleeves), since the orphanage dressed her in plain, dull threads, and as she grows her goals become evermore ambitious. Near novel’s end Anne pursues a scholarship she must earn with the highest marks in English and English literature. “I’ll win that scholarship if hard work can do it,” Anne says. “Wouldn’t Matthew be proud if I got to be a B.A.? Oh, it’s delightful to have ambitions. I’m glad I have such a lot. And there never seems to be any end to them -- that’s the best of it. Just as soon as you attain to one ambition you see another one glittering higher up still. It does make life so interesting.”<br /><br />(More plot spoilers ahead.)<br /><br />“Anne of Green Gables” also has some unexpected gems, such as a proper appeal to self-interest over self-sacrifice. After Matthew dies and as Marillia fears she may go blind, Anne decides to study at home instead of going off to college on the scholarship she’s won. Marilla says: “Oh, Anne, I could get on real well if you were here, I know. But I can’t let you sacrifice yourself so for me. It would be terrible.” Anne tells the woman who adopted her and thus made possible her many opportunities for a better life: “Nonsense! There is no sacrifice. Nothing could be worse than giving up Green Gables -- nothing could hurt me more…” Here, Anne identifies a sacrifice for what it is, giving up a value for a lesser or non value, and Marillia does what a parent should do by not expecting one’s child to sacrifice for her, identifying that prospect as “terrible.”<br /><br />But, again, the novel should be read for Anne’s unabashed benevolent spirit. While the book is filled with action scenes and dialogue that capture this spirit, here’s an exemplary descriptive passage as Anne contemplates the world ahead: “…Anne….looked out unheedingly across city roofs and spire to that glorious dome of sunset sky and wove her dreams of a possible future from the golden tissue of youth’s own optimism. All the Beyond was hers with its possibilities lurking rosily in the oncoming years -- each year a rose of promise to be woven into an immortal chaplet.”<br /><br />I’m reminded here of “Ninety Three,” my favorite column from “The Ayn Rand Column,” in which Miss Rand writes: “When people look back at their childhood or youth, their wistfulness comes from the memory, not of what their lives had been in those years, but of what life had then promised to be. The expectation of some undefinable splendor, of the unusual, the exciting, the great, is an attribute of youth -- and the process of aging is the process of that expectation's gradual extinction.“One does not have to let it happen. But that fire dies for lack of fuel, under the gray weight of disappointments, when one discovers that the adults do not know what they are doing, nor care -- that a person one respected is an abject coward -- that a public figure one admired is a posturing mediocrity -- that a literary classic one had looked forward to reading is a minute analysis of people one would not want to look at twice, like a study in depth of a mud puddle.<br /><br />“But there are exceptions.”<br /><br />Yes, there are, and “Anne of Green Gables” is one of them.<br /><br />* Joseph Kellard is a journalist living in New York.<br /><br />Copyright © 2006 Joseph Kellard.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1151574862031271962006-06-29T02:49:00.000-07:002006-06-29T02:54:22.036-07:00An Immigrant's Lesson in Patriotism<strong>An Immigrant's Lesson in Patriotism</strong><br />By Joseph Kellard<br />June 29, 2006<br /><br />“<em>America is the land of the uncommon man. It is the land where man is free to develop his genius -- and to get its just rewards</em>.” ~ Ayn Rand<br /><br /><br />As Independence Day nears and with immigration a hotly debated issue, I’m reminded of how an atheist from the Soviet Union taught me what it means to be an American patriot. <br /><br />Ayn Rand, author of Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead, wrote that America is “the greatest, the noblest and, in its original founding principles, the only moral country in the history of the world.”<br /><br />When I first read Rand’s books and heard her lectures, many of which expressed equal adulation for America, I was a left-wing ideologue who questioned whether she knew that ours was a racist society that had enslaved blacks, stole this land from the Indians, and exploited the poor, women and children. And yet, whenever I heard our national anthem, a prideful lump would inevitably form in my throat. Looking back, this tells me that I grasped, even as I bought into those vicious charges, that there was much, much more to America. So when I encountered Rand’s bold, uncompromising praise and defense of the United States -- all made with arguments atypical of the average American patriot -- she struck a chord with me. <br /><br />While conservatives claimed this land was “God’s chosen country” to explain America’s greatness, Rand asserted that this nation was the crowning achievement of the Enlightenment, the eighteenth century intellectual movement in which reason was championed, faith-based dogmas were challenged and broken, and religion’s influence in all realms was substantially weakened. Thus our Founding Fathers, from Thomas Jefferson to George Washington to John Adams, Rand noted, were primarily pro-reason secularists or deists who founded, for the first time in history, a nation based on explicit philosophical ideas -- above all, that each individual has a right to his life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.<br /><br />Rand recognized that what distinguished America from all nations, past and present, is its moral and political foundation: individual rights. That is, each man has a right to think for himself and pursue his chosen values in the pursuit of his own happiness. And so, no authority -- no gods, kings, popes, bureaucrats -- may dictate the course of any individual’s life; that he may live for himself, “neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself,” as Rand wrote. She explicitly identified that America, at root, is a nation based on reason, individualism and rational self-interest, all ideas that she celebrated in her books.<br /><br />Based on these rights and life-affirming values, and on its corollary capitalist economic system, America emerged as a nation of freethinking, hard-working, productive individuals. A land of scientists, inventors, entrepreneurs and businessmen who made possible an array of labor-, time- and life-saving advances or improvements -- including the steam engine, automobile, airplane, telephone, penicillin -- and thereby raised every man, woman and child’s standard of living, prosperity and life-expectancy to unprecedented heights.<br /><br />Rand’s books taught me these facts, and also that what is fundamental to being an American is not any irrelevant characteristics, such as one’s birthplace or race, but that one understands and chooses to live by the ideas unique to this country, yet are necessary to all men for their long-term survival, prosperity and happiness. Moreover, she taught that when evaluating historical figures, what is most relevant is not how they were like their predecessors, but how they distinguished themselves.<br /><br />I therefore understood that our Founding Fathers represent a unique bridge between the irrationalities and injustices of the old world and the much greater heights that this nation has yet to achieve. So while some Founders owned slaves, for example, it is crucial to note that slavery, in some form, existed in virtually every pre-American society. And that what is most significant about figures like Jefferson or Washington is that they were the first in history to uphold the individual rights universal to all men, thus laying the moral and intellectual foundation for slavery’s eventual abolition.<br /><br />Rand understood that America could never be a racist society and still rise to its unprecedented status, and she noted how inasmuch as racism existed, it was a force in the feudal-like, anti-capitalist, agrarian South, which lost the Civil War to the freer, capitalist, industrial North. She knew that America was not the backward, tribalist society some tried to paint it to be, and asserted that this portrait was true of the native Indians, and contested the claim they had a “right” to this land. “If a ‘country’ does not protect rights,” she asked rhetorically, “if a group of tribesmen are the slaves of their tribal chief, why should you respect the ‘rights’ that they don’t have or respect?”<br /><br />In sum, Rand unabashedly countered the claims that America owes a God for its freedom and wealth, that we Americans must live for “the common good,” and that our government must be a paternalistic redistributer of our wealth to provide others with everything from Medicaid/Medicare to Social Security. She taught that to be American, above all, means that one respect each individual’s right to live as he sees fit and to keep what he produces and trades voluntarily with others to mutual advantage.<br /><br />I’m thankful that Rand escaped the slave state of Soviet Russia, where millions of innocents were slaughtered based on such communist ideals as self-sacrifice, equality of results and an all-powerful state that dictated how others must think and live. I’m thankful Rand came to live in this nation, where she knew she was free to think independently and write books with innovative, challenging ideas, exemplified by the provocatively titled The Virtue of Selfishness. Finally those books provide a foundation on which America can properly complete and ground her revolutionary principles and reach infinitely greater, unimagined heights.<br /><br /><br /> <br />* <em>Joseph Kellard is a journalist living in New York</em>.<br /><em><br />Copyright © 2006 Joseph Kellard</em>.American Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-30211899.post-1151178988523341502006-06-24T12:54:00.000-07:002006-06-24T12:56:28.530-07:00Welcome to The American IndividualistWelcome to The American Individualist. Please check back later once I start posting on a regular basis.<br /><br />~ JoeAmerican Individualisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17091818546393154042noreply@blogger.com0