Ruminations, Haunts, and Errors

So far in 2005 the Cubs bring to mind two words: exasperating inconsistency. Lose 7. Win 8. Win-and-lose. Take 2 of 3 on the South Side. Win-and-lose some more. Drop 8, mostly to the best of the East…then drop 26 runs on the league’s best pitching to finish out the first half with a road sweep. All the while, never seeming to have the starters, relievers, and batsmen all going at the same time.

• Good: Derrek Lee’s triple-crown chase and well-deserved All-Star start. Jeromy Burnitz’s solid, if mildly ungraceful, play–especially the ability to position himself properly, throw to the right base, and hit the cutoff man.
• Bad: The revolving door to the DL. Middle relief.
• Ugly: The pathetic approach to the plate for most batters, notably Corey Patterson. Can someone not named Derrek Lee take a frickin’ pitch or two once in a while? I’ve seen way too many weak grounders and lazy fly balls on the second pitch for my liking. C’mon, Dusty, enough with the I’m-OK-you’re-OK, let-him-play-through-it approach and give these guys some incentives to take a more fundamentals-driven approach to each at-bat.

• Cuba doubts it will play in World Baseball Classic

  Cuba’s top sports official said Wednesday he doubts the nation will participate in next year’s World Baseball Classic, calling the event commercialization of the sport.

  Hmm, because ‘commercialization’ would be such a shocking, radical departure from the last 130-some years of professional baseball, huh?

Rather than just patronize local restaurants and relax, this weekend we actually took advantage of a bit more urban culture…

• March of the Penguins. Friday night we sauntered over to the Music Box to enjoy the twinkly star lights, live organist, and (most importantly from Liz’s perspective) watch this movie that was completely filled with penguins big and small, sleek and fuzzy. Fascinating stuff, both in how the filmmakers braved a year in Antarctica to obtain such amazing up-close footage and, especially, in the arduous lifecycle of these birds. That penguins survive into the next generation at all is quite astounding…good thing human procreation doesn’t require four-month fasts while standing in frigid blizzard conditions with a meager few hours of light per day! A small part of me wondered what was gained by having this film on the big screen rather than on PBS or DVD, but I suppose I feel better handing over $18.50 to support projects like this–which have the potential to raise awareness–than in support of the latest crappy Hollywood spectacular cash-maker.
• The Pain and the Itch. Saturday we went down a few stops–feeling slightly overdressed in comparison with the late-afternoon Red Line crowd–had dinner at Vinci and then took in this play at the Steppenwolf Theater. Black comedy is an apt description of this one, the dialogue is most definitely funny but the situations lead to the sorts of laughs done in lieu of cringing or crying. The story elements, and particularly the overserious psychobabble of the young parents at the center, certainly provoke some thoughts about the fine line that often stands between earnest attempts at being progressive in domestic social interactions (like child rearing and dealing with the help) and simply replacing one type of dysfunctional family dynamic with another–especially when people aren’t honest with themselves. As to be expected from Steppenwolf, the performances were very good as was the set design, complete with a backyard porch and falling snow. Perhaps best though was the writing: the dialogue was natural and witty, while the plot elements came out in small, well-timed nuggets that whacked the story along at key points and never resorted to surprises to neatly explain away something; I can recall only three major out-of-left-field items: one came with plenty of time left for it to be properly explained, another late in the second half served mainly to draw a new connection among the characters, and the final one at the end served to put a tragicomic exclamation on the play.

My camera’s working fine, I finally stopped stalking a lens and actually bought it, and now Flickr dropped their pro-account pricing. I guess I had better start shooting some more pictures now…

The Rehnquist Watch was in full swing as the latest Supreme Court term came to a close, but now Justice O’Connor’s retirement adds more intrigue. Looks like an interesting summer coming up.

But first some thoughts from this week’s opinions…

• Ten Commandments displays: McCreary County v. ACLU, Van Orden v. Perry.
  I’m a big fan of church-state separation, but I think the split in these cases took the right approach. The religious roots of our culture and society should of course never be forced on anyone, especially those dealing with the courts or government services, yet this doesn’t require us to deny their existence or completely obliterate them from view. I object to the Decalogue by itself in a place of apparent honor behind a judge’s bench because its unavoidability makes clear implications about the importance afforded to it by the court, but I can handle it’s being out in a park (especially when installed with private funds) among other monuments–even if the installers were trying to make a statement–because I can easily choose to ignore it. This seems to be the current view of the Court, and it seems a sensible middle ground.
• Contributory infringement: MGM Studios v. Grokster.
  The techie media tizzy over this one seems overblown, especially since all the Court did here was leave unchanged the case law of the Betamax decision. I think the P2P activists were probably overreaching anyway, for while Sony v. Universal City established that the capability of infringing use was not by itself a sufficient condition for liability it did not simultaneously establish that the capability of non-infringing use was an absolute safe harbor. Believing that Grokster wasn’t banking on unauthorized trading of copyrighted works to help drive the adoption of their product is akin to believing the sincerity of the head-shop dude who protests that his bongs and pipes are intended for tobacco and cloves. Besides, I think a major problem with this case was simply that it doesn’t really touch on fundamental constitutional issues, so the courts aren’t the right venue for redress, as summarized nicely by this article in the Economist
  

  The Supreme Court tried to steer a middle path between these claims, and did a reasonable job. But the outcome of the case is nevertheless unsatisfactory. That’s not the court’s fault. It was struggling to apply a copyright law which has grown worse than anachronistic in the digital age. That’s something Congress needs to remedy.

  The law that allows MGM to sue might be a steaming pile of crap, but that’s something for Congress to fix.
• Internet access and regulation: FCC v. Brand X
  Another case of crappy law: the distinction between ‘telecommunications service’ and ‘information service’ was probably contrived when the original laws were written but is certainly more so nowadays, especially given the vastly different regulatory regimes into which they fall. However, the Court did the right thing by not stepping in to impose a particular view–even if doing so would be in the public interest–regarding a statue that is stupid and illogical but not abutting any real constitutional issues. Again, the proper place to fix this is in Congress.
• Journalists and anonymous sources: Miller v. U.S., Cooper v. U.S.
  For obvious self-serving reasons, this one seems to have received the most press attention. However, while I believe that the First Amendment protections are one of the most important cornerstones of our society, I simply don’t buy into the hyperbole about the need for special protections for journalists and the ‘chilling effects’ of being forced to identify anonymous sources. For one thing, I dislike the concept of special privileges as it runs up against another cornerstone of our system: equality before the law. I don’t feel that police officers, firefighters, soldiers, etc. should be afforded any particular deference or privileges except when they are actively performing their duties, and I don’t see why journalists should be either (especially since the qualifications for ‘journalist’ are ill-defined); apparently, I’m not alone in this way of thinking. Another thing is that I don’t believe raising a journalists claim of “I promise to keep your identity a secret” to the level of doctor-patient privilege is the only way to gather information while keeping reluctant sources secret. Woodward and Bernstein’s methods for dealing with Deep Throat were pretty effective, weren’t they? Like a savvy lawyer, a good journalist could actively avoid learning any more details about his source than are necessary, thus being able to walk into court and avoid revealing the identity of a source without danger of perjury or contempt of court. Of course, a law could be passed to criminalize such willful ignorance or force journalists to assist police in tracking down the source, but since any such statute that would pass constitutional muster would immediately criminalize the activities of many lawyers and most corporations, enacting such a law would be very difficult.