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Declaration of Codependence

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1976 US Commemorative stamp

Thoughts sparked by Independence Day, and the noises thereabout:

Imagine you knew a man who never quit picking on his wife. Whenever you’re with them, he’s criticizing her. Telling her to stand up straight; you could lose a little weight; why don’t you take a cooking class; what do you do all day – the house is a mess! Constantly compares her to other women – why can’t you be like Sally? Or Phyllis? Or Amy? “You know, the fact is, my wife isn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer.”

So you take him aside and say, “Buddy, you’ve got to lighten up on your wife. You’re killing her spirit. You need to show her some love.”

And he’s offended. “What do you mean, I need to show her love! I love her to death! Everything I do and say is for her! I’m just trying to improve her!”

Would you consider that guy a good husband? Would you admire his love for his wife?

Of course not. He’s an abuser. An emotional abuser certainly, and very possibly a physical abuser too.

As I’ve mentioned (probably too often), I have some personal experience with an abuser. I’ve learned some sure marks of domestic abuse:

Abusers proclaim their love in principle – they’re offended if you question their love. “I love this person more than anybody else in the world. That’s why I have to be so hard on them. To help them be better.”

The Abuser will go on to explain that he would love to be nicer to the Victim. He dreams of being nicer to the Victim. But the Victim is so perverse, so uniquely stupid and evil, that he’s not able to go that way. The peculiar difficulty of the situation requires unusual, severe discipline. Purely for the Victim’s own good, you understand.

It seems to me this kind of behavior is apparent in the world of citizenship too.

There are people out there – lots of them, and some of them enjoy a lot of power – who say, “Well, yes, I never speak of the United States without criticism. I emphasize America’s faults, failures, and sins, and gloss over its virtues and achievements. I never compare it to other countries except unfavorably. But that’s because this wicked, vile, racist, oppressive country (which I love) has always covered up its sins in the past. If we don’t bring those sins out into the open now – put them in the spotlight, rub everyone’s face in them – we can’t do justice to history.

“I love America so much that I will show my love for it by condemning it, beating it up, throwing excrement on it. If I were to compromise and give America a moment’s affirmation, the whole project of Fundamental Transformation would fail. Because up until I showed up, nobody ever knew or taught anything about slavery.

“After all, that’s how you demonstrate love, by helping the loved one improve. By constantly denigrating them. My abuse proves my love for this vile, wicked country. Which I love so much.”

Does this analogy mean that all liberals are abusers? Not at all. There’s another category – Enablers.

Enablers disagree (quietly) with the Abusers, but haven’t the nerve to stand up to them. Because then the Abuse might fall on them. Better to let the abuse continue, and keep the peace. If you just appease the Abuser, maybe he’ll be satisfied and settle down. It’s not that big a deal.

Appeasement has always worked in the past, after all.

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Whose Fourth of July?

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Professor Glenn Loury of Brown University writes about the ‘American Project’ and black Americans in this essay from earlier this year.

When we talk about race and American citizenship, we must ask whether the currently fashionable standoffishness characteristic of much elite thinking about blacks’ relationship to the “American project” — as exemplified, for example, by the New York Times’ 1619 Project — truly serves the interests, rightly understood, of black Americans. I think not. Indeed, I think a case can be made for unabashed black patriotism, for a forthright embrace of American nationalism by black people. The “America ain’t all it’s cracked-up to be” posture that one hears so much of these days is, in my view, a sophomoric indulgence for blacks at this late date. In fact, our birthright citizenship in what is arguably history’s greatest republic is an inheritance of immense value.

He makes these four points, which you can read on 1176unites.com.

  1. The founding of the United States (1776) was vastly more significant for world history than the first arrival in America of African slaves (1619).
  2. The Civil War has a significant freedom legacy.
  3. Black Americans have been transformed and marvelously transformed themselves in the 20th century.
  4. Consider what achieving “true equality” for black Americans actually entails, an immeasurable amount of work.
Religion

In China, A Christian in a Bad Church May Have No Options

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PastorZhang San writes, “As Christians living under a communist regime—the Chinese Communist Party was founded 100 years ago [Thursday] —there is a sense in which we are blessed. As Proverbs 30:8–9 says, ‘Give me neither poverty nor riches . . . lest I be full and deny you and say, “Who is the LORD?” or lest I be poor and steal and profane the name of my God.’”

But churches hide from strangers to guard themselves against being reported to the state. If a believing family wanted to find more biblical teaching than they are receiving at their current church, they may not be able to find another congregation.

My Life as a Christian Under a Communist Regime
Fiction, Reviews

‘Savannah 1.0: The Quest for Love,’ by Terry R. Lacy

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The kitchen trash can was one of those with the electronic sensor which opened when he waved his hand over it. What had taken them so long to invent such a wonderful contraption? You could open a trash can without having to touch it? They had the ones you could open with your foot, of course, but then you had to change your socks every time you used it, and that meant you also had to wash your feet.

I don’t think I’ve every written a review like this one before. I am going to praise this book, while stating that I have no plans to continue with the series. I shall explain my reasons, anon.

Dan Mitchell, the protagonist of Savannah 1.0: The Quest for Love, is the quintessential IT nerd. He knows his job and science fiction, and pretty much nothing else. He suffers from extreme OCD, has few friends, and no hope of a girlfriend. So when the science of robotics advances (the year is 2028) to the point where robots look and act entirely human, he mortgages his house to finance the purchase of a “companion bot.”

When Savannah arrives, she’s all he hoped for and more. Beautiful, caring, sexy, eager to learn about the world. There is one small glitch, though – she doesn’t know she’s not supposed to run into the back yard naked. This gives the neighbors a show, and also gets both of them arrested. Also, it gets Dan fired from his job.

However, the robot manufacturer comes to his rescue, offering free legal representation and a new (though somewhat sleazy) job, at twice his previous salary. He begins a new stage of his life, as showing Savannah the world (and sometimes protecting the world from her) gradually draws him out of his shell.

If you ever saw the film, “Lars and the Real Girl,” there are some similarities here – except that the movie showed the main character gradually getting past his “doll” girlfriend stage to connect with a genuine woman. I’m not sure that something like that isn’t the ultimate goal here, though. There are suggestions in that direction. But this is only the first volume, and so far the depiction of human/robot relationships seems pretty rosy.

Which is where I have trouble with it. I saw this book advertised on Instapundit, but I don’t see much conservative or libertarian about it (though it’s admittedly early days). Republicans and conservative Christians are painted as a bigoted lot – because of their knee-jerk opposition to machine love.

But my big problem with the book was that I found it too personally appealing. I’m not that different from Dan, and I found the fantasy pretty seductive. I think the experience was bad for me. It comforts facets of my personality that shouldn’t be encouraged.

So I won’t continue with the series. But it’s well-written and appealing, and may even turn out fairly healthy in the end. The sex is not explicit.

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Amazon Prime video review: ‘Bosch, season 7’

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All good things must end, and Season 7, we are told, is the final series of Bosch, a superior adaptation of the bestselling novels by Michael Connelly. I just finished the last episode.

Los Angeles police detective Harry Bosch has a motto: “Everybody counts or nobody counts.” This leads him to go the extra mile for the forgotten victims – the poor, the marginalized, the powerless.

In this adventure, Harry pursues a gang lord who ordered an apartment house firebombed, to send a message. In the ensuing fire, innocent people died, including a ten-year-old girl. Bosch is ordered to back off. His superiors tell him it’s for the greater good, but Bosch isn’t buying it.

Meanwhile, his partner, Jerry Edgar, is off his game, overwhelmed with guilt because of an act he committed last season. And Lt. Billets, their boss, is fighting sexual harassment from some of her subordinates.

It’s hard to find fault with the production. The writing is top-notch, though heavily adapted from the original stories due to a major time shift to the present. Everyone who has read the books is aware of the character changes that were made – certain characters altering not only their races, but their whole personalities. One of those, however, Commissioner Irving, swerves back closer to his literary roots this season.

So it’s really good, and gets my coveted approval. My problems with it are purely in the realm of my opinions, and do not necessarily resemble the opinions of real people, living or dead. WARNING: The following paragraphs include minor spoilers.

Bosch’s daughter Maddie expresses interest in becoming a cop. This is a common thing in cop shows nowadays (I was especially disappointed at the end of Longmire, when Walt suggests that his daughter Cady run for sheriff. This was obvious pandering to the feminists, as Cady had up to that point showed no aptitude for, or interest in, law enforcement. Quite the opposite). I honestly can’t recall whether Maddie Bosch becomes a cop in the books or not. She might have (at least she’d get some training before hitting the mean streets). I’m a fossil, I know. I still think it’s wrong to hit a woman, and (by extension) wrong to put a woman in harm’s way. And I plan to hang on to that opinion until they send me to the reeducation camp.

Also, although I admire Bosch’s principles, I wonder about the real-world consequences of his lone wolf actions. It seems to me there are always tradeoffs when you’re dealing with life or death. I’m not sure Bosch’s principled actions in this series might not cost more lives in the long run than compromise would. And is this the first time Harry has seen this kind of deal made? Never made one himself? Why dig his heels in now and not before? Has he just had his fill of compromise at last?

However that may be, Bosch is a superior cop series, and I do recommend it highly. Cautions for pretty much everything.

Fiction, Reviews

‘The Drifter,’ by Nick Petrie

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Skinner was pale with rage, a peculiar glitter in his eye…. Again Peter felt that powerful urge to do him permanent damage. There was something primitive about it, like the urge to kill a snake. Snakes had a certain wrongness to them, the flickering tongue, that sinuous slither. Skinner had a different kind of wrongness. An emptiness in the eyes. An utter lack of regard for anyone other than himself. In ordinary moments he could hide it, could put on his charming act. But not now.

I’ve already reviewed one of Nick Petrie’s Peter Ash novels, but this one, The Drifter, is the first in the series. Peter Ash is a Marine, a veteran of Middle East action. He came home physically intact, but with a bad case of PTSD. It manifests itself as galloping claustrophobia. He’s spent a year mostly hiking and camping when he gets news that a good Marine buddy, Jimmy Johnson, has killed himself. Peter feels guilty – he should have gone to see him like he’d promised. So he goes to Milwaukee and finds Jimmy’s wife and two little boys struggling. He volunteers to rebuild their sagging front porch for them.

Under the porch he finds two sinister things – a large, angry dog and a suitcase filled with money and plastic explosives. What was Jimmy involved in? It turns out somebody’s been watching the house, and following Jimmy’s wife around. There’s a big plan in the works, and that suitcase is an important part of it. Very dangerous men will stop at nothing to get their hands on it.

I like this series very much, so far. Peter Ash is a great character – an Achilles with a vulnerable heel, formidable but relatable in his one vulnerability. The supporting characters are good too, and the plot is well crafted. The plight of the combat veteran is a continuing theme. Also, Peter strays onto the campus of the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, my (virtual) graduate alma mater. That doesn’t happen often in any form of entertainment.

Recommended. Cautions for language and violence.

Music, Uncategorized

‘Sigurd Jorsalfar’

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It was a beautiful day today in Minneapolis. Not too hot, and we had some afternoon showers, which makes three days in a row with rain. We needed the rain.

I also need my car back, but that’s not happened yet. Tomorrow is the day they said they’d get the cables; but I’ve already known so much disappointment in that regard that I’ve kind of resigned myself to a life of perpetual longing and disappointment, not unlike my erstwhile dreams of marriage.

So I’m giving you the music above – a piece from Grieg that I’m quite fond of. Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson wrote a play called “Sigurd Jorsalfar” about King Sigurd the Crusader of Norway. Edvard Grieg wrote the incidental music. This is the most famous of those pieces, the “Tribute March.” I seem to recall Garrison Keillor was fond of using it for parody purposes.

Sigurd is one of the most renowned kings in Norwegian history. He was remembered not only for leading a crusade to the Holy Land (he was the first European king to lead a crusade), but for being part of the last relatively peaceful reign in Norway in the Middle Ages.

The ancient laws of Norway made all of a king’s sons – legitimate or not – eligible for the crown. In Sigurd’s case, he himself shared the monarchy with two brothers with no violence, outliving them both. But after him came a string of pretenders whose claims carried varying credibility. All they needed was a story that their mothers had slept with a king of Norway, and a willingness to undergo the Iron Ordeal (you read about it in The Year of the Warrior) in some form. The result was a long period of civil wars, picturesque in their bloodshed and cruelty.

At the end of his life, King Sigurd (according to the saga) began to lose his mental faculties. He shocked the country by asking the bishop of Bergen to give him a divorce from his queen, who was much beloved by the people, so he could marry a younger woman. The bishop of Bergen refused – painfully aware that the king was sometimes losing control these days, and could kill him. The king did not kill him, however, but did an end run on him by establishing a new diocese in Stavanger and installing a new bishop there, an Englishman named Reinald. Reinald was happy to do the king a favor in return for a large monetary contribution. The bishop paid for his simony in the end, however – King Harald Gille hanged him in 1135 on suspicion of withholding royal treasure.

They played hardball in old Norway.

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Should a Christian be Cremated?

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“And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we will always be with the Lord. Therefore encourage one another with these words” (1 Thess. 4:16-18 ESV).

Encourage one another with the truth that those who die in faith will rise in faith. They have not been lost because they died before Christ’s return. These believers (including Paul, I presume) did not imagine it would be at least a couple thousand years before that return. Christ had ascended in their lifetime; why wouldn’t he come back in just a few years? Not matter when it happens, Christ’s physical resurrection and ascension is the reason we believe the dead in Christ will physically rise again.

The question for some of us is what state the body should be in for the resurrection. I heard a pastor on the radio this weekend claim the faithful would be raised from their graves as is. Of course, he said, God can reassemble any body from any state of decay, but why force him to do more than he needs to do. Why usher along the decay by cremating a family member? He asked, do you know Christ will not return a few days after your death? What if he does and there you are, a pile of ashes?

I can understand personal arguments for burial over cremation. Christian tradition leans that way. I’ve read that Christianized countries tend to bury the dead, and countries will little Christian influence tend to cremate. That’s not what we have here. The Bible does not imply we will be raised like zombies in whatever nasty state our bodies are in. Most of us (99.999% of us) will have no bodies in our graves, if we still have graves. Within a month of our interment, the best of us will not be presentable.

The Bible does tell us to respect our bodies. Our funeral services should be exercises in hope that honor the one who departed and those left behind. And since the Bible does not command Christians to bury the dead, some of us are asking whether the economic choice of cremation would show the proper respect.

That’s what it comes down to for me. In the past, burial would have been the cheapest, most natural option. Years ago when we talked to someone about buying grave plots, it was several thousands of dollars to be buried but only a few thousand, maybe only several hundred, to be cremated. I can understand how funeral and burial costs add up. When I buried my parents, I helped reduce those costs by buying caskets online. The cemetery part was already covered.

Covering a couple burials myself worries me a bit. It’s the kind of thing you can’t look up online because they won’t tell you the costs up front. You have to talk to a salesman. Hiding the price before you talk to a salesman is how they tell you it costs more than you want. They want a chance at talking you into it.

To the guy who thinks the Lord will raise the dead like zombies, come on. Even Lazarus came out of the tomb in better shape than his body had been that morning.

What do you think about burial and cremation for low-income believers?

Fiction, Reviews

‘Long Lost,’ by James Scott Bell

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Steve Conroy’s world went to pieces 25 years ago, when he was five. A man broke into his home and kidnapped his older brother. Believing the kidnapper’s threats, Steve didn’t alert anyone until morning. Some time later, his brother’s body was found in the ashes of a burned house, along with that of the kidnapper. Since then he’s lived with the guilty knowledge that he might have saved his brother if he’d called for help sooner.

He married, went to law school, and took a job with the district attorney’s office. But he developed a cocaine habit and lost everything. As James Scott Bell’s Long Lost begins, he’s trying to set up a practice on his own, living in an apartment in a sketchy neighborhood, threatened with eviction from his office. It looks as if he’s about to crash and burn again.

Then he has a remarkable day. First, an attractive young female law student shows up on his doorstep, eager to be his assistant. And a soon-to-released prisoner wants to retain him as his counsel, offering a large cash advance on his fees. Even better, the new client seems to be a genuinely positive guy, keen to turn his life around.

How is he to know that he’s soon to be targeted for murder, arrested, and faced with revelations that will re-write his own past and destroy – or resurrect – all his dreams?

I like James Scott Bell very much. He does a superior job of something I aspire to in my own books (with what success it’s not for me to say), writing Christian stories for a secular audience. Long Lost is actually a re-issue (only slightly edited) of one of his earlier books. This is visible in a somewhat less practiced hand in the writing. The Christian content is more awkward than in his later work, it seems to me. On the other hand, his greatest strength as an author – strong plotting – is very much apparent, and there are some really neat surprises along the way.

Recommended.

Fiction, Reviews

‘Dead Man’s Sins,’ by Caimh McDonnell

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Marshall’s mouth opened and closed repeatedly without producing any words. It happened enough times that you could have stuck a light in there and used him to send Morse code messages to passing ships.

There are few pleasures in my reading life to match the appearance of a new Bunny McGarry novel. Caimh McDonnell’s comic mysteries started out hilarious, and they just seem to get better. The latest, Dead Man’s Sins, is officially Number 5 in the Dublin Trilogy, though it is in fact a sequel to the first prequel. But who’s counting? Certainly not the author.

Bunny McGarry is still a Dublin police detective at this point, but is taking a sabbatical from his job. He gets a call from the widow of his late partner, who depends on him for constant help and never shows any gratitude. Two tough guys have shown up at her house, claiming that their boss, Cooper Hannity (a prominent Dublin bookie), now owns the place. Bunny “sorts them out,” but soon learns the guys were legally in the right.

Hannity’s wife is Angelina, a former ballerina and model who was once a kid Bunny mentored on the mean city streets. But she’s no help in this matter, having no control over her overbearing, possessive husband. And when murder happens, Bunny finds himself in the middle of a very neat frame that not only threatens his own freedom, but some secrets he’s been keeping for other people.

What’s wonderful about this book – aside from the hilarious writing – is that McDonnell makes the most of his characters. They keep showing us surprising facets, and those facets make the whole story more profound. Yes, I said it – profound. There are moments of genuine depth here, and glimpses of moral vision.

In between a lot of brawling and cursing and slapstick, of course.

Though, to be fair, I must admit I figured out the culprit.

Nonetheless, I really loved Dead Man’s Sins. Highly recommended, with cautions (mostly) for language.