| Tuesday,
After some exchange of letters on
Greg Cochran's theory of insanity as an inheritable disease Ed Hume says:
And I have greatly reduced shaking hands. I heard
years ago that the common cold is passed this way almost as much as
through air-to-air transmission.
As for psychiatric disorders being infectious, it
doesn't seem to be something that affects everyone in a classic way.
However, it does seem to occur. For example, in the 1960's schizophrenia
was unknown in the interior of Papua new Guinea. By the 1980's, after
civilization had arrived there, schizophrenia had also arrived. The work
was done by E. Fuller Torrey, who was my officemate at St Elizabeths
Hospital in Washington, D.C.
Schizophrenia is interesting because the
predisposition is clearly hereditary. However, who gets the disorder? Is
it like diabetes, where a predisposition is inherited? In juvenile-onset
diabetes, an infection triggers an autoimmune response that kills the
insulin-making cells. In hepatitis C, the virus slowly kills the liver, In
hepatitis B, on the other hand, it is the body's autoimmune response that
kills the liver. Perhaps some cases of schizophrenia are autoimmune
disorders.
We'll need more data. I sure hope that the govt is
devoting enough cash for research in the area of covert infectious
diseases.
ehume@pshrink.com
The government spends a LOT of
money, but I am not sure that schizophrenia is politically correct enough
or has a large enough lobby, unlike some of the others. If the women can't
get anything like as much research done on breast cancer as is being done
on AIDS, what chance to schizzy's have? This
is long and likely to strike some as partison. It too comes from Ed Hume:
Speak Out
For 50 years, the Harvard Law School Forum
has been sponsoring speeches by luminaries ranging from Fidel Castro to
Gerald Ford to Dr. Ruth. Sometimes the speeches have generated a bit of
media coverage, sometimes not. But one given last month by Charlton Heston
has taken on a life of its own.
Heston, the actor and conservative activist,
delivered a stem-winder to about 200 listeners about "a cultural war
that's about to hijack your birthright to think and say what resides in
your heart."
"He knew he was coming to a liberal
environment, and clearly a group of his listeners was conservative and
another was more liberal," said David Christopherson, president of
the forum. "About half respectfully challenged him during the
questions. It generated a lot of debate around the campus. But what
happened caught us off-guard."
What happened was Rush Limbaugh's radio talk
show. On March 15, Limbaugh read the entire speech on the air, only to
find himself bombarded with thousands of requests for a copy of it. The
same thing happened at Harvard Law.
"We couldn't keep up with all the
requests," said Mike Chmura at Harvard. "It really didn't have
legs and might have been forgotten if Mr. Limbaugh hadn't decided to
deliver it."
'Winning the Cultural War'
- Charlton Heston's Speech to the Harvard Law
School Forum, Feb 16, 1999
I remember my son when he was five,
explaining to his kindergarten class what his father did for a living.
"My Daddy," he said, "pretends to be people." There
have been quite a few of them. Prophets from the Old and New Testaments, a
couple of Christian saints, generals of various nationalities and
different centuries, several kings, three American presidents, a French
cardinal and two geniuses, including Michelangelo.
If you want the ceiling repainted I'll do my
best. There always seem to be a lot of different fellows up here. I'm
never sure which one of them gets to talk. Right now, I guess I'm the guy.
As I pondered our visit tonight it struck me:
If my Creator gave me the gift to connect you with the hearts and minds of
those great men, then I want to use that same gift now to reconnect you
with your own sense of liberty of your own freedom of thought ... your own
compass for what is right.
Dedicating the memorial at Gettysburg,
Abraham Lincoln said of America, "We are now engaged in a great Civil
War, testing whether this nation or any nation so conceived and so
dedicated can long endure." Those words are true again. I believe
that we are again engaged in a great civil war, a cultural war that's
about to hijack your birthright to think and say what resides in your
heart. I fear you no longer trust the pulsing lifeblood of liberty inside
you ... the stuff that made this country rise from wilderness into the
miracle that it is.
Let me back up. About a year ago I became
president of the National Rifle Association, which protects the right to
keep and bear arms. I ran for office, I was elected, and now I serve ... I
serve as a moving target for the media who've called me everything from
"ridiculous" and "duped" to a "brain-injured,
senile, crazy old man." I know ... I'm pretty old ... but I sure,
Lord, am not senile.
As I have stood in the crosshairs of those
who target Second Amendment freedoms, I've realized that firearms are not
the only issue. No, it's much, much bigger than that. I've come to
understand that a cultural war is raging across our land, in which, with
Orwellian fervor, certain acceptable thoughts and speech are mandated. For
example, I marched for civil rights with Dr. King in 1963 - long before
Hollywood found it fashionable. But when I told an audience last year that
white pride is just as valid as black pride or red pride or anyone else's
pride, they called me a racist. I've worked with brilliantly talented
homosexuals all my life. But when I told an audience that gay rights
should extend no further than your rights or my rights, I was called a
homophobe. I served in World War II against the Axis powers. But during a
speech, when I drew an analogy between singling out innocent Jews and
singling out innocent gun owners, I was called an anti-Semite. Everyone I
know knows I would never raise a closed fist against my country. But when
I asked an audience to oppose this cultural persecution, I was compared to
Timothy McVeigh.
>From Time magazine to friends and
colleagues, they're essentially saying, "Chuck, how dare you speak
your mind. You are using language not authorized for public
consumption!" But I am not afraid. If Americans believed in political
correctness, we'd still be King George's boys- subjects bound to the
British crown.
In his book, "The End of Sanity,"
Martin Gross writes that "blatantly irrational behavior is rapidly
being established as the norm in almost every area of human endeavor.
There seem to be new customs, new rules, new anti-intellectual theories
regularly foisted on us from every direction. Underneath, the nation is
roiling. Americans know something without a name is undermining the
nation, turning the mind mushy when it comes to separating truth from
falsehood and right from wrong. And they don't like it."
Let me read a few examples. At Antioch
college in Ohio, young men seeking intimacy with a coed must get verbal
permission at each step of the process from kissing to petting to final
copulation ... all clearly spelled out in a printed college directive. In
New Jersey, despite the death of several patients nationwide who had been
infected by dentists who had concealed their AIDs --- the state
commissioner announced that health providers who are HIV-positive need
not..... Need Not ..... tell their patients that they are infected.
At William and Mary, students tried to change
the name of the school team "The Tribe" because it was
supposedly insulting to local Indians, only to learn that authentic
Virginia chiefs truly like the name.
In San Francisco, city fathers passed an
ordinance protecting the rights of transvestites to cross-dress on the
job, and for transsexuals to have separate toilet facilities while
undergoing sex change surgery.
In New York City, kids who don't speak a word
of Spanish have been placed in bilingual classes to learn their three R's
in Spanish solely because their last names sound Hispanic.
At the University of Pennsylvania, in a state
where thousands died at Gettysburg opposing slavery, the president of that
college officially set up segregated dormitory space for black students.
Yeah, I know ... that's out of bounds now. Dr. King said
"Negroes." Jimmy Baldwin and most of us on the March said
"black." But it's a no-no now. For me, hyphenated identities are
awkward ... particularly "Native-American." I'm a Native
American, for God's sake. I also happen to be a blood-initiated brother of
the Miniconjou Sioux. On my wife's side, my grandson is a thirteenth
generation native American ... with a capital letter on
"American."
Finally, just last month ... David Howard,
head of the Washington D.C. Office of Public Advocate used the word
"niggardly" while talking to colleagues about budgetary matters.
Of course, "niggardly" means stingy or scanty. But within days
Howard was forced to publicly apologize and resign. As columnist Tony Snow
wrote: "David Howard got fired because some people in public employ
were morons who (a) didn't know the meaning of niggardly, (b) didn't know
how to use a dictionary to discover the meaning, and (c) actually demanded
that he apologize for their ignorance."
What does all of this mean? It means that
telling us what to think has evolved into telling us what to say, so
telling us what to do can't be far behind. Before you claim to be a
champion of free thought, tell me: Why did political correctness originate
on America's campuses? And why do you continue to tolerate it? Why do you,
who're supposed to debate ideas, surrender to their suppression?
Let's be honest. Who here thinks your
professors can say what they really believe? It scares me to death, and
should scare you too, that the superstition of political correctness rules
the halls of reason. You are the best and the brightest. You, here in the
fertile cradle of American academia, here in the castle of learning on the
Charles River, you are the cream. But I submit that you, and your
counterparts across the land, are the most socially conformed and
politically silenced generation since Concord Bridge. And as long as you
validate that ... and abide it ... you are -- by your grandfathers'
standards -- cowards.
Here's another example. Right now at more
than one major university, Second Amendment scholars and researchers are
being told to shut up about their findings or they'll lose their jobs.
Why? Because their research findings would undermine big-city mayors'
pending lawsuits that seek to extort hundreds of millions of dollars from
firearm manufacturers.
I don't care what you think about guns. But
if you are not shocked at that, I am shocked at you. Who will guard the
raw material of unfettered ideas, if not you? Who will defend the core
value of academia, if you supposed soldiers of free thought and expression
lay down your arms and plead, "Don't shoot me."
If you talk about race, it does not make you
a racist. If you see distinctions between the genders, it does not make
you a sexist. If you think critically about a denomination, it does not
make you anti-religion. If you accept but don't celebrate homosexuality,
it does not make you a homophobe. Don't let America's universities
continue to serve as incubators for this rampant epidemic of new
McCarthyism.
But what can you do? How can anyone prevail
against such pervasive social subjugation? The answer's been here all
along. I learned it 36 years ago, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in
Washington, DC, standing with Dr. Martin Luther King and two hundred
thousand people. You simply ... disobey. Peaceably, yes. Respectfully, of
course. Nonviolently, absolutely.
But when told how to think or what to say or
how to behave, we don't. We disobey social protocol that stifles and
stigmatizes personal freedom. I learned the awesome power of disobedience
from Dr. King ... who learned it from Gandhi, and Thoreau, and Jesus, and
every other great man who led those in the right against those with the
might.
Disobedience is in our DNA. We feel innate
kinship with that disobedient spirit that tossed tea into Boston Harbor,
that sent Thoreau to jail, that refused to sit in the back of the bus,
that protested a war in Viet Nam. In that same spirit, I am asking you to
disavow cultural correctness with massive disobedience, rogue authority,
social directives and onerous laws that weaken personal freedom.
But be careful ... it hurts. Disobedience
demands that you put yourself at risk. Dr. King stood on lots of
balconies. You must be willing to be humiliated ... to endure the
modern-day equivalent of the police dogs at Montgomery and the water
cannons at Selma. You must be willing to experience discomfort. I'm not
complaining, but my own decades of social activism have taken their toll
on me. Let me tell you a story.
A few years back I heard about a rapper named
Ice-T who was selling a CD called "Cop Killer" celebrating
ambushing and murdering police officers. It was being marketed by none
other than Time/Warner, the biggest entertainment conglomerate in the
world. Police across the country were outraged. Rightfully so -- at least
one had been murdered. But Time/Warner was stonewalling because the CD was
a cash cow for them, and the media were tiptoeing around it because the
rapper was black. I heard Time/Warner had a stockholder meeting scheduled
in Beverly Hills. I owned some shares at the time, so I decided to attend.
What I did there was against the advice of my
family and colleagues. I asked for the floor. To a hushed room of a
thousand average American stockholders, I simply read the full lyrics of
"Cop Killer" -- every vicious, vulgar, instructional word.
"I GOT MY 12 GAUGE SAWED OFF. I GOT MY
HEADLIGHTS TURNED OFF. I'M ABOUT TO BUST SOME SHOTS OFF. I'M ABOUT TO DUST
SOME COPS OFF..."
It got worse, a lot worse. I won't read the
rest of it to you. But trust me, the room was a sea of shocked, frozen,
blanched faces. The Time/Warner executives squirmed in their chairs and
stared at their shoes. They hated me for that. Then I delivered another
volley of sick lyric brimming with racist filth, where Ice-T fantasizes
about sodomizing two 12-year old nieces of Al and Tipper Gore.
"SHE PUSHED HER BUTT AGAINST
MY...."
Well, I won't do to you here what I did to
them. Let's just say I left the room in echoing silence. When I read the
lyrics to the waiting press corps, one of them said, "We can't print
that."
"I know," I replied, "but
Time/Warner's selling it." Two months later, Time/Warner terminated
Ice-T's contract. I'll never be offered another film by Warner's, or get a
good review from Time magazine. But disobedience means you must be willing
to act, not just talk.
When a mugger sues his elderly victim for
defending herself ... jam the switchboard of the district attorney's
office.
When your university is pressured to lower
standards until 80% of the students graduate with honors ... choke the
halls of the board of regents.
When an 8-year-old boy pecks a girl's cheek
on the playground and gets hauled into court for sexual harassment ...
march on that school and block its doorways.
When someone you elected is seduced by
political power and betrays you... petition them, oust them, banish them.
When Time magazine's cover portrays
millennium nuts as deranged, crazy Christians holding a cross as it did
last month ... boycott their magazine and the products it advertises.
So that this nation may long endure, I urge
you to follow in the hallowed footsteps of the great disobedience's of
history that freed exiles, founded religions, defeated tyrants, and yes,
in the hands of an aroused rabble in arms and a few great men, by God's
grace, built this country.
If Dr. King were here, I think he would
agree.
Thank you.
And thank you, says I.
Remember when...
Close your eyes.....And go back in time....
Before the Internet or the Mac...
Before semi automatics and crack...
Before SEGA or Super Nintendo...
Go way back........
I'm talking about hide and seek at dusk.
The Dickie Dee man,
Red light, green light.
The corner store.
Hopscotch, butterscotch, doubledutch, jacks,
kickball, dodgeball,
Mother... May I? Red Rover and Roly Poly
Hula Hoops
Running through the sprinkler
Wax lips and mustaches
An ice cream cone on a warm summer night
Chocolate or vanilla or strawberry or maybe butter
pecan.
Wait...... there's more...
Watching Saturday Morning cartoons...short
commercials, Fat Albert,
Road Runner, He-Man, The Three Stooges, and Bugs
Or staying up for Gunsmoke
When around the corner seemed far away,
And going downtown seemed like going somewhere.
A million mosquito bites.
Sticky fingers.
Cops and Robbers, Cowboys and Indians, Zorro.
Climbing trees
Building igloos out of snow banks
Walking to school, no matter what the weather.
Running till you were out of breath
Laughing so hard that your stomach hurt
Jumping on the bed. Pillow fights
Spinning around, getting dizzy and falling down was
cause for giggles.
Being tired from playing.... Remember that?
The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a
team.
War was a card game.
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon.
Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike
into a motorcycle.
I'm not finished just yet...
Eating Kool-aid powder
Remember when...there were two types of sneakers for
girls and boys (Keds, PF Flyers) and the only time you wore them at
school, was for "gym."
It wasn't odd to have two or three "best"
friends.
When nobody owned a purebred dog.
When a quarter was a decent allowance, and another
quarter a miracle.
When you'd reach into a muddy gutter for a penny.
When nearly everyone's mom was at home when the kids
got there.
It was magic when dad would "remove" his
thumb.
When it was considered a great privilege to be taken
out to dinner at a real restaurant with your parents.
When girls neither dated nor kissed until late high
school, if then.
When any parent could discipline any kid, or feed
him, or use him to carry groceries, and nobody, not even the kid, thought
a thing of it.
When they threatened to keep kids back a grade if
they failed and did!
When being sent to the principal's office was
nothing compared to the fate that awaited a misbehaving student at home.
Basically, we were in fear for our lives but it
wasn't because of drive -by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc.
Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger
threat! and some of us are still afraid of them!!!
Didn't that feel good.. just to go back and say,
"Yeah, I remember that!"
Remember when............
Decisions were made by going "eeny-meeny-miney-mo."
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming,
"do over!"
Race issue" meant arguing about who ran the
fastest.
Money issues were handled by whoever was the banker
in "Monopoly."
The worst thing you could catch from the opposite
sex was cooties.
It was unbelievable that dodgeball wasn't an Olympic
event.
Having a weapon in school, meant being caught with a
slingshot.
Nobody was prettier than Mom.
Scrapes and bruises were kissed and made better.
Taking drugs meant orange-flavored chewable aspirin.
Ice cream was considered a basic food group.
Getting a foot of snow was a dream come true.
Abilities were discovered because of a
"double-dog-dare."
Older siblings were the worst tormentors, but also
the fiercest protectors.
If you can remember most or all of these, then you
have LIVED!!!!
Pass this on to anyone who may need a break from
their "grown up" life...
I DOUBLE DOG DARE YA!!!
Indeed. But that was in another
country...
Dear Dr. Pournelle,
Your current problems with Microsoft software remind
me of previous problems with Linux. The first time I installed Linux, it
was an early version of Slackware on a non-Intel 386SX, with a non-Intel
387 chip, and whatever BIOS my local builder installed. I would give you
brand names, but my brother has used this relic for years, and he lives
elsewhere.
This was an earlier time. Windows 3.1 and Linux
could both fit on a 512 MB IDE disk, and 8MB of memory would do the job.
Following the Slackware instruction pamphlet carefully, I left Windows in
the first primary partition, and attempted to put Linux and the swap space
in extended partitions. I don't care what the instructions said, Linux
required a Linux native partition and swap space on primary partitions.
This problem did not happen on another computer I purchased a short time
later, and never showed up on SCSI machines, including this same machine
when I converted it to an Adaptec 1520 SCSI, which has its own BIOS.
Microsoft said long ago that they could not
guarantee that their generic Windows 3.1/95/98/CE/ME/NT/XP/2000 would work
with every combination of CPU, BIOS, and peripheral in existence. The
Linux community tries hard, but they are always behind, and do not claim
full compatibility anyway. I suspect you have found a combination that
slipped through the Redmond tests, and the intermittent nature of your
problems convinces me that Microsoft has stumbled yet again.
There are debugging experts that could pin down your
problems, but they do not work for free, unless they are very close
friends. I am not good at debugging, using substitution as my main tool,
and lots of patience and logic to overcome a lack of funds. Pinning down
intermittent plug-ins and faulty monitors has taken months with my small
setup.
regards,
William L. Jones wljones@dallas.net
The hardware in question is pretty
standard, Intel Motherboard and CPU. I suspect there is some hardware
problem but until I replace the machine and get a substitute running I
can't take it apart.
Hey Jerry,
In a recent column you put in a plug for my favorite
piece of freeware, IrfanView. I also consider it a "must have"
on any system I work on, and enthusiastically recommend it to others. I
just want to point you to another piece of freeware that I consider as
essential: Note Tab Light ( http://www.notetab.com
). The Light version is entirely free (no adware or such), while some more
enhanced versions have a cost attached. To me, this application makes
Notepad so far obsolete it isn't funny. Note Tab has everything I could
ask for in a simple text editor, and far more.
As a standard disclaimer, I am in no was associated
with the producer of the Note Tab software. I am just an extremely
satisfied and enthusiastic user.
"Highly recommended" (to quote a popular
author I know).
Regards,
Mark Lovik
Agreed. I use Notetab and I like it
a lot.
This guy seems to
share your opinions on the cause of the "power crisis", I'm not
sure I'd spend the kind of money he did but it's interesting. Although I
don't think that the huge state subsidies he's recieved would remain
available too long if lots of people signed up...
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2001/04/10/MNE217012.DTL
Gabriel Underwood
Indeed
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