Gun Control: Failure of the state

Gun control is the most obvious failure of the state in modern America, right?

From the 1960s to the 1990s, America, especially in its cities, experienced a dramatic rise in violent crime. The violent and deadly nature of this crime was accompanied by the wide availability of firearms.

The best response to this sort of thing is to stop people from engaging in crime; it's possible that the rise was driven by lead, or many other factors, but finding and identifying those sort of origin aspects of this are difficult.

Another thing to do, and what most other countries did, would have been to get rid of all the guns -- even if people were going to be crazy, if you take away the ability, the desire doesn't matter.

But we couldn't do that either. The American political system was so broken that individuals didn't trust the government enough to deal with the problem. Instead, it created a backlash that created a desire to increase the availability of firearms.

It's a pretty clear example of a failure of state legitimacy. And now, even though the crime crisis has passed, I still have to deal with a bunch of crazy people who now use the issue of gun control to validate their "fear" of the state.

(I know that they don't have a real fear of the state, because they don't care about other "Civil Liberties" at all.)

Origins of Political Order: Mistaken About Evolution

I just finished Part 1 of Francis Fukuyama’s Origins of Political Order. First off, I like the book. He’s an evolutionist, and a Hobbesian, which is to say that he understands human nature, and he bases his theory of the state upon that foundation.

Now, a mistake: Fukuyama’s description of human evolution is wrong. It’s only a little bit wrong, but it’s totally wrong. Fukuyama tells the familiar “one tribe out of Africa” story. We now know this is wrong, because we have genetic evidence of interbreeding with Neandertals, not to mention Denisovians, and presumably dozens of biologically modern Homo Sapien tribes that left Africa at different times.

Of course, Fukuyama’s book was published a month before that paper came out, and presumably written a while before.

On the other hand…

For a genetic example of what happens when one people conquers another, we need look no further than the high frequency of European Y chromosomes in the Americas. I would expect most pre-historic genetic exchanges to follow similar models. When an anthropologist says “population displacement,” we should interpret that to mean “they killed all the men and raped and married the women.” This means that conquerors not only take their enemies’ land, they also absorb genetic information, which is then selected for.

Fukuyama is exactly the sort of person who ought to have doubted the old story. Rome claimed to have founded itself upon a crime of mass rape. And the old testament doesn’t shy away from what to do with conquered people. Fukuyama actually quotes Genghis Khan and notes his massive offspring.

So, while one can hardly blame Fukuyama for making this error, since it was the conventional scientific view, if he had been following his own method of science+anthropology+historical analysis more rigorously, he might not have.

Of Kellys and Kellys

So I grew up with a gal named Kelly and I have a friend named Kelly and I was thinking about what would happen to various Kellys.

My friend Kelly recently gave up the teevee because he doesn’t think it’s good for his kids. But it’s great for me because he gave me a bunch of DVDs. These exist in a legal gray area which I describe as “these are mine until Kelly wants them back.” I’ve even lent out a couple of these DVDs to a dude named Spencer. Spence watches DVDs quickly and will have them back soon. But anyway, there are a bunch of Kelly DVDs at my house right now and I basically treat them as my own property.

What would happen if Kelly were to, for some reason, contact the police and tell them that I stole his DVDs (probably worth hundreds of dollars)? The DVDs are his, he’s got the receipts. All I’ve got is an explanation that he said I could have them. I’m pretty sure the law would side with him.

What if Kelly was a girl and I had sex with her? Even though the harm to the victim is much worse (rape being worse than theft), the rules change! If you’re taking sex from someone instead of property, the law presumes consent, and it’s up to the victim to prove they said no.

Now I say the fact that the victim is complaining to the police is pretty good proof that they were not on board with the whole thing. But this is where most “liberal” men I know get off the progressive train. And I’d like to know why.

How to cook a meaty tofu

And the question was asked: "My skills are totally lacking in the tofu dept. I've only used soft stuff in miso soup. What do you recommend for a more 'meaty' tofu?"

Good question! First, you're going to need to get yourself some firm tofu. You can buy it for $4 at a white person grocery store. I buy it a case at a time for a dollar a pack at the Asian grocery store. You can also buy "Extra Firm" tofu, which I am convinced is a marketing gag.

Once you've got the right kind of tofu, you need to "press" it to remove excess water. If you hate trees you can wrap it in paper towels and then put a cutting board on top of it to remove the extra water. The longer it presses the better. I usually wait about 30 minutes. Since I don't hate trees I have a couple of cloths that I use for the purpose.

Now your tofu is pressed. Cut it up into pieces, in whatever shape you want it in. If you end up dry frying it (see below) you'll want it thin. Vanessa thinks it's cute when I cut it into triangles.

Now, the cooking. You have a many options, but I'm going to suggest three: Baking, Oil Fry, and Dry Fry.

Baking is the easiest. Get yerself a marinade. I like to throw soy sauce, cooking wine, vinegar, garlic, etc. into a baking dish. Let the tofu hang out in there. Who knows, you could get crazy and add a lime. Stick it in the oven to bake. The longer it bakes, the better it tastes, but the lower the temperature needs to be. Stick it in for 375 for 30 minutes, and subtract 25 degrees for every extra 30 minutes you can leave it in there. I'm not a scientist or anything, but I think 250 degrees is about the lowest you should go. Check it every 30 minutes. Throw it in anything you want.

Frying takes a bit more attention, but is way quicker than baking. Rice takes 35 minutes and I can usually start the rice and be done with the stir-fry before the rice is done.

First, you need a cooking pot. I use a fairly fancy wok, but that's because I'm a huge snob. The most important thing is that whatever you use has to be nonstick. Tofu sticks and it is no fun.

Dry frying is healthy, easy, and fully discussed here.

Most of the time I fry the tofu in oil. Get your pot out, coat the bottom in oil. Vegetable oil fries the best, but I like olive because I like the taste. Plus it lets me claim all of my dishes are Greek-Chinese fusion. The oil should be hottttt, just hot enough to not splatter all over you when you drop the tofu in. Flip the tofu around fairly frequently until it's a golden brown. Then drop in whatever spices you want. Most recipes will tell you to take the tofu out at this point and add it to your stir-fry later, but I'm lazy and just throw the next group of ingredients in at this point.

If you want to be super-fancy you can bread your tofu (after you press and cut it) in a mix of corn starch and spices. Then fry it as above. The first time you try this you'll screw it up because either it'll stick together or you'll get too much corn starch in the oil and the whole thing'll turn to mush. But once you get the hang of it you'll amaze the neighbors.

I've also got a deep fryer that I use from time to time, and my world renowned tofu scrambles, but those are stories for a different day.

The case for Bonapartism

I’ve mentioned this to several people already, so I thought I’d take the time to explain myself online.

Basically, the prevailing “Democratic Peace” theory holds that Democracies tend not to go to war, and don’t ever go to war with each other. This theory may or may not still hold, depending on how “democratic” Serbia was when we bombed them in the 1990s or whether or not Russia and Georgia count as democracies. I tend to think the theory is at least partially true, as democracies at least tend to evaluate their own interests similarly. But even if you don’t think there’s a current example, it’s at least possible to imagine two democracies going at it – most wars have popular support when they’re started, after all.

In contrast to the prevailing theory, these guys argue that young democracies are actually more likely to go to war than other states. If you ignore the mythologizing about democracy, it makes sense. When a country goes democratic the rulers change, and the new government is likely to perceive the interests and global order of the country differently than the previous state. Ideological re-alignment brings instability to stable regions and can therefore easily lead to wars. This probably applies to the shift to any new governing order as well (think of Communist Russia’s survival war after the Russian Civil War, Mao picking a fight with Russia, et cetera, et cetera).

The textbook case for this is, of course, Revolutionary France. Following the extinction of the French monarchy most of Europe declared war on France, which started a spiral of events that eventually led to Emperor Napoleon conquering most of Europe and cheerfully extinguishing monarchies all over the place. Napoleon was able to do this because spreading France’s revolutionary ideals was tremendously popular in France – France was the first nation to be able to fully mobilize for war. Killing kings is fun, apparently.

Egypt is a big country – 80 million people – twice as large as the next largest Arab country. Its politics and culture dominate the Arab world. In short, it occupies the same place in Arab culture as France held in European culture in 1800. Its military is big, modern, American armed, and American trained. Israel is basically the only country in the region that could hope to beat it. It has the capability to be an army of Arab liberation.

Egypt’s culture has been pan-Arabic for as long as it has been independent. They merged with Syria for a couple of years, invaded Libya, and supported a democratic uprising in Yemen. This is not likely to change. What is changing however, is that they are likely to be led by a revolutionary government soon.

Egypt is about to be a big country with a modern army ruled by people who view all Arabs as brothers and democracy as a birthright of humankind. Where is Lt. Bonaparte?

The only thing lacking in this scenario is the triggering event to send Egypt’s army on the march. For Revolutionary France, it was other European countries declaring war on the young republic.

The United Nations just declared Libya a no-fly zone. While it looks like France, Britain, and America will enforce the no-fly zone, they’ve basically ruled out sending in ground troops. Eventually ground troops will, in fact, be necessary (the alternative is portioning Libya). Neither Obama nor Sarkozy nor Cameron have any interest in sending in ground troops, the memory of Iraq is still fresh enough to prevent that – which leaves a “volunteer” “arab” force. Which means next-door Egypt.

And a week later the Arab world finally gets the hero this revolution needs – the great liberator of Benghazi. Where does he stop? Don’t the people of Yemen deserve freedom? Doesn’t the house of Saud pollute the holy land? Aren’t the Sudanese really just “Upper Egyptians”?

Some people think Egypt will become a member of the great democracy club. Other people worry about the Muslim Brotherhood turning it into the next Iran. No one seems to be worrying about an Egyptian Bonaparte, but they should be. I'm not saying it's the most likely possibility, but it's certainly a possibility.

Isn't there a soul in there?

When a person suffers some sort of total and permanent brain damage, a la Terri Schiavo, people divide up into familiar pro-life/pro-choice groups.

This doesn't make any sense to me. Notionally, religious people claim to be committed to the views of soul-independence and soul-having-ness. That is to say, that the soul is independent of the body, and that humans have souls while they're alive. It also appears that religious folks think the soul is connected to the experiences of the body (i.e. you get to see your loved ones in heaven) in a way that requires the soul to be aware of bodily experiences, even if the mind isn't directly aware of the soul.

So if you believe all that, isn't keeping a vegetative person alive for decades a kind of torture to the soul? The usual sort of Natural Law arguments that are used to justify this bizarre beliefset don't seem to make any sort of sense here, because a vegetative person is undoubtedly being kept alive through the magic of modern science — god's will is clearly to let the person die. Alternatively, if the soul leaves the body when the mind does, then all this energy is being spent to keep unresponsive meat "alive", and that doesn't seem to make sense either.

Other sorts of "No You They Really Think This" theories are well-established, such as the notion that many pro-life activists are really anti-sex or anti-woman activists, or that the most virulent anti-gay bigots are closet cases. Clutching on to a dead person's body after it's clear that their mind is gone, seems to just be a sort of naive unwillingness to deal with reality. This mentality doesn't seem to spring forth from any sort of religious thinking, but it may be the same sort of instinct that also compels religious thinking.

Is being gay a choice?

This question seems to matter to a lot of people, but I can't really see why it does.

That's not true. I know why it matters to some people.

This seems like a clear example of the Deontological/Consequentialist divide in ethics, in a popular ethical discussion.

My position is, obviously, that I don't care why. If being gay is a choice, then choosing to be gay is making someone happy, so they should go for it. Laws should arrange themselves around persons for the maximum amount of happiness possible.

But some people really seem to care if it's a choice.

Of course, I really don't believe in "choices" at all. So there's that.