Happy Almost Friday. Let’s all start slacking a little early, shall we?
Slacker!
I’m not saying that there’s a China bubble, but if I was, this is the sort of stuff that I would worry about.
OPEC saw an almost 20% decrease in revenues last year. It will be interesting to see how nations hold on with less hard currency to trade for free shit.
It’s really amusing watching the MSM twist their panties in a wad trying to connect Trump to Russia. They’ve gotten the smallest amount of traction and the chants for Trump’s head have started. Besides the fact that the original Trump to Russia connection is based on innuendo and suggestion, the witch hunt has broadened out into a general search for any connection between Trump and the entire nation of Russia. Like a brain damaged chihuahua, the media chants “Russia! Russia! Russia!” hoping beyond hope that they will scare the GOP and Trump into submission. “We can finally control the renegade!” they think, as they piss away the last of their credibility.
Although people joke about “alternative facts,” it’s not a joke. There are two prevailing agendas across the country: 1) Trump is LITERALLY HITLER and A RUSSIAN MOLE AT THE SAME TIME!!! 2) Trump is DADDY and GOD-KING OF KEKISTAN, VANQUISHER OF THE SJWs and CUCKS!!! The left has their educational and media empire churning out outrage by the gallon. The right has their independent media matching the outrage of the left.
Antifa is smashing windows and folks like Based Stickman (who the fuck is Based Stickman and why is he called that??) are bashing Antifa heads in. People are primed to believe that the violence will do nothing but escalate.
I tend to be quite skeptical of claims that the next civil war is about to start. Like the Rapture, many people have predicted a civil war, only to be laughably wrong.
However, let’s travel through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of derp. A journey into a scandalous land whose boundaries are that of imagination. That’s the signpost up ahead – your next stop, the Derplight Zone!
This is Donald. Donald is a normal man, somewhat spoiled, somewhat outspoken. Donald has been a real estate mogul for the last few decades, accumulating a vast amount of wealth and notoriety. Recently, Donald was chosen to be the sacrificial lamb of the GOP to allow Hillary Clinton to ascend to her rightful place as Grand Master of the Lizard People The First Female President of the United States. However, something went wrong. Horribly wrong. Donald had an energy that transfixed the public, and nobody could explain it. Donald became President.
Okay, I can’t keep the Twilight Zone schtick up, but let’s continue to investigate why this latest push to impeach could lead to a civil war. There is one big reason why: Trump’s election was an unexpected boon to a class of people that have felt trod over by the political elites for decades. People most fiercely defend unexpected gains, especially when it is threatened by their enemy. The Alt-Right has ascended and has labeled Trump as their knight in shining armor, here to wipe out the scourge of establishment politics and social justice. The Fascist Left has also ascended, using Hitlerian tactics while decrying Trump as literally Hitler. While an escalation of rhetoric isn’t a sure sign of war, it is a prerequisite.
The desperation seen on both sides is significantly more concerning. Antifa Nazis have normalized mob violence and intimidation as protest tactics, and Alt-Righters have responded in kind. This powder keg is gonna blow at some point, and we’re gonna get another Kent State. The question then becomes what happens in response to the deaths of 5 or 10 rioters (of either side). Everything in my mind and heart tells me that a crisis like that would boil up for a few weeks and slowly subside. However, what if it didn’t? What if it boiled up into a tempest?
I think it’s unlikely but possible that this could happen. Either Antifa is gonna beat some people to death, or the Alt-Righters are going to start shooting when Antifa gets violent in the wrong town. This could escalate to people seeking out the melee to contribute, which could escalate to large-scale violence between groups of people. . . also known as a battle. From there, things could snowball into nationwide insurrection.
Obviously, I find this quite improbable, but the increasing violence and radical rhetoric inspire some unlikely thoughts.
Well, I’m headed to Dallas today to drop my daughter off at the airport so she can head to California for the summer and teach kids how to swim, and artificially inseminate cattle. I just gotta get on Amazon and order her a gross of turkey basters before I go.
Read the links…
Hoo-boy, did the Penguins ever shit the bed last night in the first period. It was probably as painful to watch for Pens fans as that rendition of “O Canada” before the game started. I swear that took 15 minutes. And half of it sounded like gibberish. Anyway, I think the Senators are gonna win that series now. And I think Nashville will win the west. Which will get us that dream matchup all hockey purists have been begging to see.
OK, I’ve dithered enough. There was some real shit that went down and we need to talk about it. So I bring you…the links!
All art movements have a pioneer, either in the form of a single person or a group of people who band together out of a similar aesthetic. The pioneer of the Metalist School is clearly Mr. Patrick Tribett. This is easily his most famous piece.
Untitled, 2005. Gold spray paint on shaved skin, cotton t-shirt
Arrested by the police during an art installation at a Dollar General Store in Ohio, Tribett shot to fame. Aside from the disheveled hair, a nod to previous Dollar Store artists, Tribett’s vision was bold and unheralded. His jaw was canted against stale tradition. The use of a simple t-shirt merged the high art world to the crass commercialism of professional sports, but slyly matched the shade of his paint on the second iteration on his chest, Warriors degraded to Faded Warriors, with the hint below that they might be Warrior again someday. His dead eyes demanded that you take his art seriously… and the world did.
Tribett never regained the success of his first major work. While Tribett continued to sell new pieces as fast has he could produce them, he was savaged by critics who called him derivative and uninspired.
Untitled Triptych, date unknown, private sale
As Tribett faded into the background of the art world and rumors of drug use began to swirl, it fell to the heirs of Tribett’s artistic vision to carry on.
Such as this anonymous artist and his vital, even at times furious, attempts to recapture Tribett in 2008:
His first, almost tentative steps, into the Metalist School are still amazing for what is essentially a street artist.
Moving on to bolder strokes in only a few months…
And this, his most defiant work. He is an artist saying “I am here world! And I have paint on my face!”
Some attempted to injection even more defiance…
And some relied on childlike whimsy…
And the bravest used the medium to problematize gender…
“Even as a small MAAB, I always felt deep down that I was a robot hooker.”
But sadly, like many art movements, the Metalist School descended into facile parody.
Sometimes more isn’t better.
Does this buffoon understand metal paint? Or even where his mouth is?
Happy Wednesday that feels like it should be Friday. There’s a CSI van parked across the street. I’m expecting David Mancuso and the hottest female cop to ever wear a badge and a silk blouse to stop by any moment. Oh look, Firstros win again.
This… is my BOOMSTICK!
BP CEO writes that global energy demand remains strong and growing, but abundant supplies of oil and gas are now a fact of life. No word on how many barrels they plan to lose unproductively to poorly-capped wells or plant explosions this year. The joke about working for BP’s plant in Houston was that the money was okay, but the survivor benefits were what really mattered.
Chelsea Manning is a free citizen. Just remember when you read all those anonymous leakers who claim to be in and around the Oval Office that actual brave government employees who leak actual secrets get thrown in prison or exiled.
Greeks demand an end to austerity. So nice of the birthplace of democracy to demonstrate its terminal state as well
Legislative Hurdles To National Security In The Civil Maritime Domain
Ie. A *Starting Point* for Maritime Deregulation
Part 3.
5. Inefficient Cargo Preference Requirements
Turning again to the regulations in question and their relevance in twenty first century operations, it is important to examine the specific national security concerns they addressed at the time of their introduction.
While the Military Cargo Preference Act of 1904 (10 USC 2631) specifies that all cargoes purchased by the armed forces must be carried on a US flagged vessel – excepting where unavailable due to resources and/or costs are unreasonable – it does not require a great deal of effort to justify the use of a foreign-flagged vessel in the case of an emergency. In a situation not dissimilar to the previous contradiction noted with the crewing differences between military and civilian operators, 31 of the 46 Ready Reserve Force ships maintained by the military for emergency transport of materiel in case of war, were constructed outside the United States and are therefore ineligible for any use domestically were they to be sold to a US-flagged operator in the future.
USNS Supply resupplies a Danish Navy frigate and USS George H.W. Bush
In an amendment to the Merchant Marine Act of 1936, passed in 1954, at least 50% of all general US government cargo must also be carried by US-flagged vessels. The type of cargo specified in this legislation has generally focused on high volume products like food aid to be delivered overseas – and this amendment was further modified to 75% specifically in relation to food aid deliveries in 1985. While it is not hard to fault the original intent of the legislation at the time it was developed, it appears to have very little utility in everyday operation – and in fact is more harmful than beneficial. In the case of a real emergency or wartime situation, the military already has large amounts of munitions and materiel pre-staged. During routine operations, there are far fewer routine shipments needed for military support than earlier in the 20th century – which makes sense given the smaller numbers of vessels involved as well. Naval resupply for instance is predominantly conducted underway between Naval vessels and Maritime Sealift Command (MSC) auxiliaries – commercial vessels never enter the equation. An exception to this from recent years has been the drawdown of military materiel following the formal end of hostilities in Iraq and to a lesser extent, Afghanistan.
In general, Cargo Preference to date is limited to emergency food aid and similar emergency aid programs. The utility of this program has deteriorated greatly due to the increasing variability of international harvesting results. Even Federal Aid Agencies are becoming less likely to utilize these programs – even when still required to by law – it can be far more efficient both in time and money to purchase the necessary aid or in the vicinity of the emergency and have it transported locally – rather than paying to have it acquired and shipped internationally on a ship that may not immediately be available when needed.
These acts and the issues they embody are further reflected by MARAD’s Maritime Security Program. Out of 110 US-flagged vessels participating in international commerce, a full 60 are enrolled in the Maritime Security Program. By participating in this program, the operators acknowledge that the ships will be made available to the US government at the earliest possible convenience in the event of an emergency or wartime situation. In exchange for this availability, these operators receive a cash allotment of about $3.1 million per vessel per year or about $8500 per day. While initially appearing to be a significant amount, as the PwC MARAD report demonstrates, that amount only covers about 2/3 of the daily differential in operating costs between US and foreign-flagged vessels. [But it’s still your taxpayer dollars being shelled out]
6. Security Issues Specific to the Jones Act
Returning to the Jones Act as a commercial speed bump, it is possible to force exceptions through, but the process is cumbersome and time intensive and requires action at the congressional level. This includes a considerable number of cases where vessels have been repaired or refurbished overseas but have been certified by the Coast Guard that their refurbishments did not exceed reasonable limits as established by the Second Proviso of the Jones Act – currently listed in 46 CFR 67.177. This issue is complicated enough on the surface – attempting to calculate the mass differentials from multiple pieces of equipment out of a very large vessel – but it often becomes far more politicized as commercial competitors will attempt to challenge each other on the legality of any foreign repairs. Leaving aside that the repairs have already activated the Ad Valorem duty by default, if a corporation can prove that more than, say 7.5% of a competitor’s vessel’s steelweight has been repaired or worked on, that would potentially void the Jones Act eligibility that vessel for future operations. Bearing in mind that the National Vessel Documentation Center is the only fully civilian staffed command under the Coast Guard – and possesses neither the resources nor qualified manpower to inspect the ships during refits to verify the claims made by the companies – which by and large have proven accurate under penalty of law. This is also a sort of situation open to abuse in that in a number of cases, decisions by the Coast Guard have been retroactively reversed or thrown out by courts based on these corporate complaints, although the Coast Guard assessments have been conducted in good faith in accordance with their established legal precedents. It is difficult in many cases to determine whether any US jobs are currently being lost by work conducted overseas due to the timing involved and the limited number of active shipyards – estimates and guesses are freely distributed by both sides of the argument, but there are no solid numbers available.
The legislative limitations of the Jones Act are also such that those situations in which the casual observer would expect common sense to address swiftly, become political footballs. US Coast Guard icebreakers for instance are an extremely valuable asset, but as there are only three currently active (between six and ten would be required to adequately meet all current operational goals), a waiver was required from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in order to resupply Nome, Alaska, after a Russian ice-class tanker was forced to take on fuel from Dutch Harbor to deliver to Nome as weather prevented the intended pickup in a Japanese port. This situation among others, verges on the legal absurdity of applying a near-century old law in a blanket format with no available consideration for logic.
Just tuggin’ along…
In another situation, an oil drilling company which had previously been granted a Jones Act Waiver by DHS (under National Security auspices) to transport an oil rig from Texas to Alaska using a foreign built, foreign owned vessel was told that the waiver had been revoked and would require a new application. Although the company halted the transit in Vancouver and used a US towing company to take the rig the remainder of the way, they were still fined $15 million – the equivalent value of the rig itself – for breaking the coastwise trades portion of the Jones Act. This was in spite of a lack of available Jones Act eligible vessels needed for a timely transit and the fact that DHS refused to review their appeal in regardless of Congressional support, although – for example – 56 Jones Act Waivers were granted in the period of July-August 2011 (utilizing the identical national security rationales to allow private companies to transport oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve). As the largest fine of its type to date, it’s also something of a precedent in that the company was charged the full value of the vessel being transported even though as an actual vessel it was argued that it should not be treated like ordinary cargo or merchandise being transported from one port to another port. [Because FYTW]
This scenario does bring up a related question that has yet to be addressed, but which also further exposes the limitations of the Jones Act. Recently, vast reserves of natural gas have been located offshore of Alaska. These reserves are easily exploitable, and would benefit the state and country immensely – but for one issue. Even if there are new Liquid Natural Gas terminals constructed on the west coast, it will be impossible for any LNG tanker to qualify for the Jones Act – in part due to the limitations discussed previously, the US simply does not possess the shipbuilding capability to construct one. Given the legal precedents already established, it is unlikely that any corporation or vessel would receive a blanket waiver for the life of one or more foreign-built vessels to engage in Alaska to West Coast deliveries. That basically means that under current legal rulings, Alaska will be required to transport and export all their natural gas internationally, with no net gain to national energy security.
7. Potential Corrective Legislative Actions
So, returning to legislative actions that would provide a net gain to national security utilizing Mahan’s rationale, each previously discussed act will be reviewed.
The Military Cargo Preference Act of 1904 and all the follow-on associated legislation should be scrapped in full. The US military already maintains its own Ready Reserve Force in addition to the federally operated Maritime Sealift Command ships. Any needs beyond that in time of emergency should be addressed as needed – utilizing appropriate contingency planning and the best vessel available at the time of the requirement – without excessive micromanagement or favoritism. Security concerns would obviously be observed and dealt with accordingly as necessary. In the case of non-military cargoes, the respective federal agencies and departments should again be free to negotiate for the best available carrier to transport their cargo. In this time of skyrocketing deficits – it is important to provide the best possible deal for the taxpayer.
The Ad Valorem duty portion of the Tariff Act should be fully rescinded. It functions simply as a punitive tax on companies that have very few options to begin with, while not providing any actual incentive to have repair work conducted in a US shipyard. A better alternative might be to provide tax breaks for operators – US-flagged and otherwise – who do conduct their maintenance availabilities and repairs in US shipyards. Additionally it is far too arbitrary in its enforcement – between the precedent-based measurements conducted by the Coast Guard, and the irregular legal reversals in the courts.
Regarding the Jones Act itself, depending on the legislative process it might be easier to address the various issues in individual amendments, as opposed to replacing the entire piece carte blanche. For instance, the citizen crew requirement should be removed immediately – at least for the seamen – although it would be worth reviewing in further detail whether that citizenship requirement should be left fully in place for ship officers. Similarly, it should be examined further whether there is any inherent harm in removing the right to sue from a seaman injured onboard a vessel. If insurance provided by the operator is adequate, in accordance with the routine union protections, there ought not to be any loss suffered by the seaman. Again, there are precedents set for this that can be reviewed – both as a matter of routine policy for all US service members, but also for the seamen employed by non-US-flagged operators.
Coast Guard to the rescue!
Finally, regarding the Coastwise Trade requirements of the Jones Act – it is reasonable to maintain the existing regulations for trade on the inland waterways of the United States – to include the Great Lakes – the precedents and general operating procedures established there are not in dispute. However, at this time, given the existing restrictions and limitations on US shipyards, it makes no sense to maintain the US-flagged requirements for all trade between mainland ports, with particular emphasis on trade between the mainland and Alaska, Hawaii, Guam and Puerto Rico. Like the Ad Valorem Duty issues, it is a regulation that has outgrown its utility in the last century and causes more considerably more economic hardship than benefit for both the operators and customers. [A number of estimates place the cost of shipping a container from San Diego to Hawaii at 10 times the cost of shipping the same container from San Diego to Shanghai. Numbers have fluctuated a little over the years.]
8. Conclusion
Reducing or eliminating these regulations should not be carried out in a vacuum, but in conjunction with providing more incentives to operators and service providers. As with other industries, it should be the goal of the government to make normal business operations easier, not more difficult – whether in developing or maintaining a shipyard, transporting cargo and passengers, or anything else. These are all capital-intensive industries that provide a very large number of secondary and tertiary jobs and business opportunities across the country – which in turn provide far more tax revenue in net gains. It is possible to restore and revitalize our nation’s maritime tradition, but the way forward involves far less government interference and legislation, not more.
Well the Spurs sure got their asses kicked. Like K-I-C-K-E-D. The only downside to that I can see is that these beatings will precipitate Popovich’s Hillary Lovefest media soundbites played incessantly on ESPN. Because I can assure you they’re coming as soon as the Spurs are out of the playoffs (which will be in two more games). Also, go Nashville! The Predators took the series lead against the Anaheim Mighty Ducks…that team named after a freaking Disney movie. Also, the Firstros pounded the crap out of Miami and just keep chugging along with an 8 game lead. Keep it up, boys, and I’ll come see a game soon. Oh yeah, and the conspiracy theorists are already out in force after the Celtics and Lakers went 1-2 in the NBA draft lottery. Good luck dealing with LaVar Ball, Lakers front office. That dude is cancer.
That’s pretty much it for sports unless you want to talk soccer. But I think waiting until Monday for that would be appropriate. So that’s what I’m gonna do on my end.
Newspaper sues to open hearing in IRS Tea Party targeting case. I just hope an open hearing doesn’t result in the public finding out what happened. Because they might result in threats against the people that conspired to wholesale violate guaranteed constitutional rights, or something.
History is a funny thing- things which are truly world-changing rarely hinge on a single man and a single moment. Had Gavrilo Princip, for example, not pulled the fateful trigger that hot summer day in Sarajevo, World War I would have still happened, just triggered by something else. Bismarck had presciently observed, “One day the great European war will come out of some damn foolish thing in the Balkans,” and indeed the flow of events there was inexorable.
But here, I will tell of one of those moments that truly was sui generis, a huge change in the course of the world’s history, determined by one man and one moment. And it was one of the more outre incidents in the history of Jews, who represent a vanishingly small proportion of humanity.
Tisha B’Av is a day of mourning in Judaism, the traditional anniversary of the destruction of the first Temple in Jerusalem. As so often happens, its significance metastasized, and before too long, much in the manner of our national portmanteau of Washington and Lincoln’s birthdays, it became the anniversary of the destruction of the second Temple, the anniversary of the quashing of the Bar Kokhba revolt against the Romans, the anniversary of the Moses-era Israelites being barred from Canaan until their generation had died out, the anniversary of… well, you get the idea. Something bad happens to the Jews, it’s Tisha B’Av. Wanna bet that if Keith Ellison gets promoted to DNC Chairman, it will be on Tisha B’Av?
In any case, Tisha B’Av has an aura of portent. In the year 1626, on Tisha B’Av, a child was born to a former chicken salesman turned British agent in Smyrna (then Greece, later Turkey, then Roman, then Greece, then… anyway, now it’s Turkey) named Mordecai Zevi and his wife Clara. The child was named Sabbatai. As was the custom in the day, L’il Sab Zevi was sent to yeshiva for training in the Talmud (which to the Torah is analogous to case law to the constitution). L’il Sab was about as receptive to this training as I was when I was sent to yeshiva (i.e., not very), but unlike the young me, L’il Sab had a great affinity for the Kabbalah and Jewish mysticism.
As he grew into his teen years, he was married to an arranged bride. There’s no record of what she looked like, but one can only imagine, since they were granted a divorce because of non-consummation. I remind you that this was a teenage boy. So his parents tried again- same result. At this point, he likely came to the conclusion that his parents had no eye for a pretty Jewess and no further attempts in this direction were made.
Two more bits of superstition converged: the British concept of millenarianism fixing the date of the Second Coming at 1666 and the tortuous computations of Kabbalistic scholars that 1648 was the magic year (since you had to have a First Coming to qualify for a Second one, amiright?). Zevi, who no-one could accuse of lack of ambition, announced that he, in fact, was the long awaited Messiah. And he did so in a beautiful troll, the pronouncement of the Tetragrammaton in Hebrew, something only allowed to the High Priest in the (at that point non-existent) Temple. This caused him to be driven out of Smyrna, though some noted that he hadn’t been struck by holy lightning from above.
From Smyrna, Zevi next settled in Constantinople (not Istanbul) and apparently convinced the Kabbalah scholar Abraham ha-Yakini of his divinity. Ol’ Abe, once convinced, did two things to advance the narrative: first, he encouraged Zevi to really publicize his Messiahship. And second, in order to shore up Zevi’s claims, Abe forged some ancient documents which “predicted” that a guy named Sabbatai born in Smyrna would be the Messiah. Abe well understood viral marketing.
As part of the marketing, Abe convinced Zevi to decamp to Salonika, at that time a center for mystical Judaism. Zevi made a big splash there, setting up publicity stunts like marrying the Torah in a public ceremony. The local rabbis were not amused and Zevi found himself on the run. Exactly what his path was is unknown to us, but he ended up in Cairo, where he brought a rich fellow named Raphael Yusef Ḥalabi under his sway. Halabi is a familiar type to us, someone with more money than brains (his money was mulcted from the Turkish treasury, perhaps through the Halabi Foundation?) more than a bit of nuttiness. Halabi was the proverbial pigeon just waiting for the right guy to pluck him, and Zevi was definitely the right guy.
Well funded and with much publicity and buzz, Zevi thought that Cairo wasn’t the place to be for a Messiah, and moved himself to Jerusalem, a more fitting location. Mindful of the two towns who rode him out on a rail, Zevi was more low-profile this time around, but used the quietus to set up the dominos. He groomed himself as a personality, a celebrity, known for singing, religious performance (people were more easily entertained in those days), ostentatious worship, and yes, giving candy to the kids.
It did not escape Zevi’s notice that 1666 was rapidly approaching, so it was time to make his move. As usual in Progressive communities, a financial crisis reared its head in Jerusalem. Zevi said, “No worries, I got this,” and went back to Cairo to hit up his old sugar daddy, Halabi, for fundage. Halabi coughed up. I mean really, the Messiah asks you for money, you’re gonna say no? While he was back in Cairo, he spotted some jailbait named Sarah, who apparently was a hottie and a slut. Zevi sensed another marketing opportunity, as well as a way to drain the decades of back-up, and he married her. In fact, he married the hell out of her, and with high-profile trim at his side, his fame increased yet again. Every Jim Bakker needs a Jessica Hahn.
Zevi brought the riches and his 16 year old hottie back to Jerusalem and on the way, stopped in Gaza and met the man who would be the John the baptist to his Jesus. This fellow, by the name of Nathan of Gaza, styled himself as the reincarnation of Elijah and started proclaiming Zevi’s messiah-hood.
On Zevi’s arrival in J-town with the loot, he instantly became a celebrity, a savior of Jerusalem as it were. Having the trophy bride with him didn’t hurt. Not unexpectedly, Nathan’s proclamations and Zevi’s assent royally pissed off the Jerusalem rabbis and, you guessed it, Zevi found that discretion is the better part of valor and got out of Jerusalem more or less intact to head back to Smyrna.
His fame and his supporters preceded him. Traveling through Gaza, Aleppo (“What’s an aleppo?”), and finally Smyrna, Zevi picked up thousands of followers, and in Smyrna, modestly declared himself Messiah in a most public way. And just in time, it was 1665, only a year to go. Zevi was a sharp operator and very quickly became the boss of Smyrna, usurping the incumbent rabbinate and replacing them with his cronies. His following increased rapidly, with people getting rid of their possessions, and making the trek to Smyrna from all over Europe and Asia Minor. Even luminaries like Spinoza heard of this phenom and touted the return of the Jews to their restored kingdom.
This was serious shit and Zevi’s popularity was exploding. And when that happens, you know there will be a reaction from those already in power who could possibly feel threatened. Zevi had displaced important rabbis, declared that, with his coming, the rituals and obligations of rabbinic Judaism were ending, and that the rule of political authorities over Israel would soon be replaced by his spiritual authority. Zevi’s publicist released the following statement:
The first-begotten Son of God, Sabbatai Zevi, Messiah and Redeemer of the people of Israel, to all the sons of Israel, Peace! Since you have been deemed worthy to behold the great day and the fulfilment of God’s word by the Prophets, your lament and sorrow must be changed into joy, and your fasting into merriment; for you shall weep no more. Rejoice with song and melody, and change the day formerly spent in sadness and sorrow into a day of jubilee, because I have appeared.
This did not go unnoticed by the Sultan, who “suggested” that Zevi come to Constantinople (not Istanbul) to discuss the matter. This was aw-reet with Zevi, since he had prophesied that the Sultan would crown him by placing the Sultan’s own crown on his head, so off to Constantinople (not Istanbul) he went.
Now, you don’t get to be Sultan without having a streak of deviousness and ruthlessness, and this Sultan was no exception. Zevi landed in Constantinople (not Istanbul) and was almost instantly arrested. You don’t get to be a Messiah without similar deviousness, and through use of bribes, Zevi managed to get the country club treatment, and during that time, his publicists spread tales of miracles performed. Sort of the Streisand Effect- trying to suppress him only made him bigger. Zevi milked the publicity by continuing to troll in a high profile way (for example, a very public violation of the Paschal sacrifice).
At this point, the Sultan thought, “Enough.” He had been tipped off about Zevi’s viral marketing and decided to do a bit of a high profile troll himself. Zevi was brought to him in a very public manner, and when he arrived at the Court, it was filled with what passed for VIPs and the media in those days.
“Zevi,” said the Sultan, “I’m giving you a choice here. You can put a turban (not mine!) on your head symbolizing your conversion to Islam. Or we could bypass all that and just take off your head. Which is it?”
Now here is that moment. If Zevi had decided to sacrifice himself, he would be, in the words of John Lennon, bigger than Jesus. He would be martyred, sacrifice himself for the world, spawn resurrection stories, and be the founder of what could be the world’s biggest religion, supplanting much of Christianity and Islam. One man, one moment.
And the fact that we’re not surrounded by Zevi-ists and that he’s not exactly a household name in the 21st century kinda gives away what he chose. Zevi, always looking out for Zevi, decided that maybe the turban would be a good look for him. He kept his head on his shoulders, and was “retired.” He of course spread the rumor that this was all part of the plan, but his career was over, his followers were disgraced, and the sultan was barely talked out of killing all the Jews just to prevent any more of this nonsense. Zevi was eventually banished to Albania, where he died shortly after from causes that are lost in the same obscurity where Zevi ended.
One man. One moment. If the choice had been martyrdom, every football player who scored a touchdown would be making beheading gestures instead of the sign of the cross.
Its another edition of the Tuesday Afternoon Links.
“Stay the fuck out of [Miami], [Vásquez Orellana]!” (Former Chavista minister gets hounded out of Venezuelan bakery.) [ED: Link Fixed. Sorry!}
“Men’s” fashion alert — rompers for men are never okay once you can dress yourself. (They know it, too. This guy, chose wisely in not wearing his romper to a Cubs game)
Slate says you should believe anonymous sources over an official going on record because — I shit you not –“The Post’s sources have made factual allegations that can be checked. The administration hasn’t.” My days of not taking Slate seriously is coming to a middle.
And for the serious news — King of Thailand, normal guy. Well, I mean, he’d fit right in in Florida. But apparently his government is unhappy about this display.
Its weird, somehow this cop OD’d on something (just by touching it!) that lots of other people encountered without PPE. I’m not saying its not true, but it seems a little breathless.
Also, it looks like the US is looking at ditching 5.56 chambered rifles for the 20th time in 10 years. Although a 6.5mm seems like a decent trade off between weight on your back and energy to the target when fired.
Things were different in many ways a century ago, but in one respect it was like all places at all times: there were insurance agents.
Monument to insurance agent, Donetsk, Ukraine
Robert T. Cheek of St. Louis, Missouri, was one of those insurance agents, selling policies in his hometown for the Prudential Insurance Company. In the 1910s, after many years of what he obviously considered faithful service, he left his job and began looking for work with another insurer. He asked his former employer, Prudential, for a letter describing his work and the reasons he left.
Prudential refused to provide such a letter. Without such a “service letter” from his prior employer, Cheek had trouble getting another job in the insurance field. Insurance, as he claimed, was pretty much what Cheek knew, and he didn’t want to go into another line of work where he didn’t have so much experience. He thought he was being blacklisted.
So he sued Prudential in a state court in St. Louis. In that part of the case which is relevant for our purposes, Cheek said that Prudential had violated Missouri’s “service letter” statute. Missouri law required that an employee who had worked 90 days or longer for an employer could demand that his ex-boss provide a letter saying that he used to work for that boss, and explaining why he doesn’t work for that boss any longer.
States like Missouri which passed these “service letter” laws were concerned about employer blacklists. If an employee had crossed his ex-boss, the boss might just decide not to help that employee get new work. But if the boss was forced to give a service letter, the employee could obtain information about his work history, without which new employers might not want to take a chance on him. And if the ex-boss gave the former employer a bad reference, the employee could sue for defamation.
The trial court in Missouri threw out Cheek’s suit. Sure, Prudential hadn’t given Cheek a “service letter,” but it didn’t have to do so. Anyone, even an insurance company, has the right to free speech, which includes the “right of silence” – that is, the right not to talk.
Precedents from other states, like Georgia, indicated that service-letter statues violated the freedom not to speak, and therefore violated the freedom of speech as constitutionally guaranteed by state constitutions. Of course, a company didn’t have the right to lie about former employees – that would be defamation. But if an employer didn’t want to talk about an ex-employee, it shouldn’t be forced to talk.
Cheek took the case to the Supreme Court of Missouri, which in 1916 gave Cheek a victory and upheld the “service letter” law. Those other courts which had talked about a constitutional right to silence were simply out of harmony with the up-to-date enlightened principles of 1916. After all, all that the service letter law demanded was that a company give truthful information about former employees who had worked for them for three months or more. Disclosing accurate information – how could mandating that violate any company’s rights? The court spoke of the legislative struggle against blacklisting, and how the service letter law was a modest tool to help victims of that iniquitous practice.
Now it was Prudential’s turn to appeal, all the way to the United States Supreme Court. To defend his position, and the Missouri service letter law, Cheek had Frederick H. Bacon as his attorney.
At some point, I’m bound to get tired of telling food puns, right? Right?
Bacon, a Michigan native who practiced law in Missouri, had written a textbook on insurance law. Perhaps Cheek hired Bacon because of the attorney’s knowledge of the insurance industry, although this was not a specifically insurance-oriented case, but a broader labor-law case. And, as it turned out, a First Amendment case.
In those days, pretty much anyone with enough money could take their case to the United States Supreme Court. So many people exercised this right that there was a bit of a backlog, which may be why it took until 1922 for the U. S. Supremes to give their opinion in Prudential Insurance Company v. Cheek.
Most of the opinion dealt with the issue of economic freedom – in those days the Supremes still recognized the right of businesses to operate free from arbitrary government restrictions. But Missouri’s service-letter law was not arbitrary, said the majority opinion. Companies just had to provide accurate information about former employees. It wasn’t like Missouri was trying to cartelize the ice business or anything oppressive like that.
But the Supremes still had to deal with Prudential’s argument based on free speech, and the corollary right not to speak. Remarkably, the Supremes had not yet decided, one way or another, whether the First Amendment’s rights of free expression even applied to the states.
In 1907, the Supreme Court assumed, for the purpose of argument, that the 14th Amendment required the states to respect freedom of the press. But Thomas Patterson, said the Court, had abused his freedom of the press by criticizing the decisions of the Colorado Supreme Court in his newspaper, for which the state supreme court could legitimately convict him of contempt. Patterson, owner of the Rocky Mountain News and an influential Democrat, had run editorials and cartoons accusing the Colorado Supremes of acting in subservience to corporate interests when it awarded elections to Republicans and abolished home rule for the state’s cities.
Nowadays, people in Colorado are much more mellow
In a case arising out of the First World War, the Supreme Court assumed, for the purpose of argument, that the 14th Amendment required the states to respect freedom of speech. But Joseph Gilbert, said the court, had abused his freedom of speech, and could legitimately be punished by the state of Minnesota for making the following wartime remarks:
We are going over to Europe to make the world safe for democracy, but I tell you we had better make America safe for democracy first. You say, what is the matter with our democracy? I tell you what is the matter with it: Have you had anything to say as to who should be President? Have you had anything to say as to who should be Governor of this state? Have you had anything to say as to whether we would go into this war? You know you have not. If this is such a good democracy, for Heaven’s sake why should we not vote on conscription of men? We were stampeded into this war by newspaper rot to pull England’s chestnuts out of the fire for her. I tell you if they conscripted wealth like they have conscripted men, this war would not last over forty‑eight hours…
Minnesota don’t want none of your free speech unless you bash Huns, hon
(If you’re interested, here is a highly sympathetic biography of Mr. Gilbert.)
In both of those cases the Court had assumed, without deciding, that the states had to respect freedom of expression. The issue hadn’t affected the outcomes of those cases because the Justices didn’t think freedom of expression applied to the insidious activities of Patterson and Gilbert.
Now, suddenly, the Justices decided it was time to make an official ruling: Do the states have to obey the First Amendment? In other words, do the basic rights protected by the Fourteenth Amendment against the states include free expression (subject to common-sense regulations such as suppression of wartime dissent)?
Here’s how the Supremes answered that question in Cheek’s case:
the Constitution of the United States imposes upon the states no obligation to confer upon those within their jurisdiction either the right of free speech or the right of silence….
Cheek won, and Prudential and the First Amendment lost.
Apparently, Cheek was able to get back into the insurance business. When he died in 1926, his death certificate said that at the time of his decease he had been an insurance agent for the “Missouri State Life Co.”
The year before Cheek’s death, the Supremes were back to their old tricks, refusing to say whether states have to respect the First Amendment’s rights of free expression. This was in a case involving a Communist firebrand, Benjamin Gitlow, who had written a manifesto advocating revolution. In a key paragraph, the Court said:
For present purposes we may and do assume that freedom of speech and of the press-which are protected by the First Amendment from abridgment by Congress-are among the fundamental personal rights and ‘liberties’ protected by the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment from impairment by the States. We do not regard the incidental statement in Prudential Ins. Co. v. Cheek…that the Fourteenth Amendment imposes no restrictions on the States concerning freedom of speech, as determinative of this question.
Then the Supremes went on to do what they had done in the cases of Patterson and Gilbert – they declared that Gitlow had abused his First Amendment freedoms and could rightly be punished for it, even if the First Amendment applied to the states.
Benjamin Gitlow running for Vice President as a Communist in 1928
So it was back to the old drawing board – the applicability of the First Amendment to the states was still officially unresolved.
In two key cases in 1931 (here and here), the Supremes finally decided that the states did have to obey the free-expression guarantees of the First Amendment.
The first of these decisions said that both the federal and state governments have to respect your right to wave a communist flag. The second decision said that the government (whether state or federal) can’t shut down a newspaper as a “public nuisance.”
(Here is a book about the freedom-of-the-press case, Near v. Minnesota).
Neither in their published opinions nor in their private papers through 1931 did the Justices engage in any detailed examination of the question of “incorporation” – whether the states had to obey the First Amendment and if so, why. The Supremes just veered from one side to another, almost as if they were flying by the seat of their pants and not acting on any coherent principle. It was only later, in subsequent cases, that the Justices began working out various rationales for applying the First Amendment to the states (TL;DR version – because free expression is a Good Thing and is Good for Democracy).
A good guess would be that, when the Supremes were unenthusiastic about free expression, they weren’t that interested in imposing it on the states, but when (as in the 1931 cases) they got interested in free expression, they decided it was time to make the states as well as the feds respect that right.
Many states still have service-letter laws to this day. Check your local listings.
Works Consulted
Floyd Abrams, The Soul of the First Amendment. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2017, pp. 60-62.
“Anti-Blacklist Law Upheld,” Iron County Register (Ironton, Missouri), December 7, 1916, http://bit.ly/2rjmnTh
Ruth A. Binger and Tracy R. Ring, “BEWARE – PROCEED CAUTIOUSLY – WHAT THE MISSOURI EMPLOYER SHOULD KNOW ABOUT THE SERVICE LETTER STATUTE AND DEFAMATION.” St. Louis: Danna McKitrick, P.C., Attorneys at Law, WWW.DANNAMCKITRICK.COM, 2003.
Vickie Caison, “Bacon, Frederick H.” Friends of Silverbrook Cemetery, last updated November 22, 2010, http://www.friendsofsilverbrook.org/site4/obituaries/95-bacon-frederick-h
Russell Cawyer, “Texas Has No Enforceable Service Letter Statute,” Texas Employment Law Update, December 2, 2011, http://www.texasemploymentlawupdate.com/2011/12/articles/human-resources/texas-has-no-enforceable-service-letter-statute/
“Robert T. Cheek,” St. Louis, Missouri City Directories for 1910, 1913 and 1916, Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1822-1995 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
Richard C. Cortner, The Supreme Court and the Second Bill of Rights: The Fourteenth Amendment and the Nationalization of Civil Liberties. Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press, 1981.
“Frederick H. Bacon,” Find a Grave, https://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/fg.cgi?page=gr&GSln=bacon&GSfn=frederick&GSmn=h&GSbyrel=all&GSdyrel=all&GSob=n&GRid=60501380&df=all&
Klaus H. Heberle, “From Gitlow to Near: Judicial ‘Amendment’ by Absent-Minded Incrementalism,” The Journal of Politics, Vol. 34, No. 2 (May, 1972), pp. 458-483
“Labor and Employment Laws in the State of Missouri,” Fisher and Phillips LLP, Attorneys at Law, www.laborlawyers.com.
“Master and Servant: Blacklisting Statute: Failure to Give Service Letter,” Michigan Law Review, Vol. 8, No. 8 (Jun., 1910), pp. 684-685
Ruth Mayhew, “States that Require an Employment Termination Letter,” http://work.chron.com/states-require-employment-termination-letter-24010.html
Missouri State Board of Health, Bureau of Vital Statistics, Death Certificate for Robert T. Cheek, St. Louis, Missouri, c. March 1926 [courtesy of Ancestry.com]
“Online Books by Frederick H. Bacon,” Online Books Page, University of Pennsylvania, http://bit.ly/2r9YTDm
Robert Gildersleeve Patterson, Wage-Payment Legislation in the United States. Washington: Government Printing Office, 1918, p. 75
James Z. Schwartz, “Thomas M. Patterson: Criticism of the Courts,” in Melvin I. Urofsky (ed.), 100 Americans Making Constitutional History: A Biographical History. Washington, DC: CQ Press, 2004, pp. 154-56.
Ralph K. Soebbing,”The Missouri Service Letter Statute,” Missouri Law Review, Volume 31, Issue 4 Fall 1966 Article 2 Fall 1966, pp. 505-515.
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