BREAKING NEWS! Partial Transcript of God’s Testimony Before the Senate Judiciary Committee

SEN. LEAHY: Thank you for coming out here today to talk to us…

GOD: My pleasure Mr. Chairman.

LEAHY: I wonder if you could start today by talking about the concerns some members of this committee, as well as many Americans, may have about so-called “theistic activism.” What do you see your role as, if you were to be confirmed as the world’s sole omnipotent being?

GOD: Well, thank you, Senator Leahy. That is certainly a concern. I agree with you that it is a god’s job to apply the commandments, and not make the commandments. The role of deities is not to legislate from heaven. The role of any deity is to interpret the law and apply it on a case-by-case basis. I think every deity has to make a good faith effort, looking at applicable precedents and the text of the commandments violated.

LEAHY: So, just to be clear, you wouldn’t let personal politics play a role in your eternal judgments?

GOD: No, that’s certainly not the role of any ultimate judge or authority. My personal opinions about right and wrong are not to affect my judgments.

LEAHY: Thank you…Sen. Franken, any questions?

SEN. FRANKEN: Yes. Mr. God, how would you describe your own personal theistic philosophy, if you have one?

GOD: I think if I had to pick one, it would be fidelity to the commandments, or accurate interpretations of scripture….

The Problem With Brüno: What Is This a “Satire” of?

Josh points out that Sacha Baron Cohen is being held to an unfair standard in many reviews of Brüno: Why is a comedian obligated to perform social commentary? The goal of Brüno is not to end homophobia, it’s to be funny. 

The fact is that Cohen has never really been a social commentator: Even his work as Borat never had the exaggerated social implications that some people claimed. The people featured in the film were generally marginal, or their prejudices came as no surprise. What does come as a surprise, and is more often mined for laughs by Cohen, is tolerance and social manners.

In Brüno, this is even more obvious. The jokes in the film don’t often come from highlighting homophobia, but from what exactly Cohen can get away with. Can he talk on the phone while he’s getting his anus bleached? Yes. Can he get Paula Abdul to sit on a Mexican worker posing as furniture? Yes. Can he show his penis to a focus group, and then make it talk? Yes. Can he pretend to fellate a ghost in front of a psychic? Yes.

In Defense of Brüno

Brüno’s been getting mixed reviews, many of which are unjustified. Ann Hornaday of the Washington Post reflects the critical reviews well by claiming: “In Borat, Cohen created a weird but mostly likable naif, whose bumbling travels revealed the roots of fear and ignorance that grow into larger and more dangerous hatreds. Brüno is no Borat. His narcissism, combined with the fact that the scenes in ‘Brüno’ are far more obviously staged than in the previous movie, give the entire enterprise a nasty and, worse, irrelevant tone… ‘Brüno’ could have been a flawlessly timed satiric contribution to the conversation about gay civil rights.”

Whatever Works Doesn’t*

*Well, it kinda does, but we couldn’t resist.

WARNING: Plot spoilers contained in this post.

Woody Allen’s Whatever Works brings him back to New York City and unites him with who may be a perfect partner-in-crime, Larry David. NPI’s amateur film critics, Tim and Josh, discuss whether it all, well, works.

Are We Overreacting to the Henry Louis Gates Scandal?

The news tends to amplify single events, implying a general trend where none exists. This seems to be exactly what is happening in regard to the Henry Louis Gates situation. For those unfamiliar, Gates, a prominent black scholar, was arrested in Cambridge, MA, after he “broke into” his own home because the door was jammed shut. Already people are implying that this single instance has undone any racial progress Barack Obama made last year.

Looking at the details of the case, however, the situation reveals itself to be an unfortunate misunderstanding. Obviously, Gates should never have been arrested, but the Cambridge Police Department quickly dropped the charges and has since apologized. This doesn’t undo the wrong, but it suggests that the arrest was more the result of a misunderstanding than malice. This wasn’t exactly Martin Luther King, Jr. getting arrested in Birmingham.

Ranking the Bill of Rights, Number 10: The Second Amendment

Luckily, the Bill of Rights is more limited than history. So, rather than ranking 173 historical happenings, I can get away with ranking a much more manageable ten amendments, which constitute the United States’ Bill of Rights.

Coming in last place is the Second Amendment which reads: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the People to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

Seriously, Framers? That’s the best you can give us? The Second Amendment is—by far—the most poorly worded and punctuated amendment. The opening noun clause “a well regulated Militia” is neither the subject nor the object of the sentence. The opening phrase isn’t even necessarily part of the substance of the amendment, but rather a justification for the amendment. But, if the justification no longer holds—if a well regulated militia is not so necessary for a free state—does the declarative clause lose its meaning? Antonin Scalia maintained that it did not in the Heller case, claiming that the first clause is a prefatory clause, a non-exclusive reason for having the right to keep and bear arms. Moreover, there is significant ambiguity as to what constitutes “Arms” and at what point a right (which is arguably collective despite Scalia’s ruling) is infringed. And, what the heck is that comma after “Arms” doing there?

Elementary, My Dear: Did Golf Have the Perfect Finish Sunday?

He plays golf. Your grandfather. Your grandpappy. Golf. A golf man. Is my tone communicating the contempt? Billiards on a big table, Jim. A bodiless game of spasmodic flailing and flying sod. A quote unquote sport.

—Infinite Jest

The criticisms of golf are many: It is boring, it is prejudiced, it is unfashionable. Most perniciously, it is not a sport.

I am not here to defend golf as sport; I’m more than willing to relinquish that fight, so long as you do the same with regard to bowling, track, swimming, cross country, and soccer, among others.

But golf’s always tenuous hold on sporthood survived one of its strongest challenges yet Sunday, when a seven-foot putt off the flatstick of 59-year-old Tom Watson sputtered off line and fell short of its target on Turnberry’s 72^nd hole. In the process, the game* of golf had its cake and ate it, too: On a weekend absent of Tiger Woods—for the second consecutive year at the Open—Watson’s astonishing contention was the only major storyline—one that attracted far more viewers than a leaderboard of Lee Westwood, Mathew Goggin, and Stewart Cink ever could. At the same time, the fact that the 59-year-old Watson didn’t win restored, for the moment, golf’s lingering claim to sporthood.

*Note the noun.

The Top 173 Things in History: #170. The Articles of Confederation

Look, we all know the basics here: Articles of Confederation bad, Constitution awesome. No one’s denying this. But there is one thing that the Articles of Confederation provide that the Constitution never could: perspective.

Without the Articles of Confederation, would we have any idea how great the Constitution is? Or would we just assume that founding governments was pretty simple? The Articles, then, act as the ugly friend that makes a girl look better, the draft bust that makes you appreciate when your team gets it right, the bad trailer that lowers expectations for the good movie.

I mean, the Constitution’s “We the people…” preamble is okay. It’s nice; not thrilling, but nice. Compared to the Articles’ “To all to whom…” opening, it’s practically prosaic. Have you read the start of this thing? The opening paragraph is a really long and confusing way of saying, “Hello.” To go from “We hold these truths to be self-evident…” to “To all to whom…” is embarrassing. “We the people…” at least has some dignity to it.

Furthermore, the Articles located some potential missteps—like “one state, one vote”—that the Constitution was able to avoid. In essence, it was a rough draft—a very rough draft—for one of the great documents of all-time. And if the principles it espoused were later resurrected during the Civil War, who cares? That’s the price of perspective.

Monday Medley

What we read while pondering confirmation bias:

• Time‘s profile of Newark Mayor Cory Booker warms one of our Jersey-raised hearts, even if it fails to answer its most intriguing question: How has the election of Obama “diluted the Booker brand?” Sean Gregory’s piece seems to do a better job of getting to know Booker in a shorter amount of time–see: the “Frasier” anecdote–than last year’s Esquire profile that earned a letter to the editor from Booker himself. Of course, all these profiles of Booker give credence to the criticism that the mayor can’t get enough publicity.

• You know what we never understood about Frogger? Drowning. Aren’t frogs amphibians? As in, gills and lungs? Or are we remembering freshman year bio wrong? (N.B. The main problem with this version: You can’t get “just the right amount of grease on the joystick.”)

• An extensive profile of the the NPI-consensus best announcing trio in baseball… and sports. Hat Tip to Neil Best whose Watchdog blog we also endorse, particularly for those interested in sports media.

• We blogged about Paul McCartney this week and, so, it’s fitting to reccomend this fascinating interview with the Beatles’ sound engineer Geoff Emerick. His memoir/account of his time with the Beatles, Here, There, and Everywhere, is highly recommended.

On “You’re Welcome”

I find social norms interesting especially when it isn’t entirely clear why they exist. One I was pondering in a state of half-sleep last night was the norm of saying, “You’re welcome” after “Thank you.”

Why do we say it? The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) cites the first documented usage in W.W. Jacob’s 1907 Short Cruises. And, OED defines it as “a polite formula used in response to an expression of thanks.” While “you’re welcome” is sometimes used as a “polite formula,” those who use “you’re welcome” often have a more precise intended meaning. When someone responds, “you’re welcome,” they are acknowledging that thanks is owed. Let’s call this type of response to “thank you” a category one reply.