Top100—Banned Books
Welcome to banned book week. To celebrate, I’m going to do something covert and read a Harry Potter book. Yes, the popular book series is on the lists of 100 most frequently banned or challenged books. (link)
So are a lot of other classics, like Animal Farm, The Grapes of Wrath, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and the Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.
Now, if they simply banned James Joyce’s Ulysses, I might agree that this list would be worth it to protect high school students, like me, from losing sleep, questioning my own abilities to understand the English language, and generally wondering if there is a god.
But book censorship is a slippery slope for any society. Presidential candidate John Kennedy defined the issue well: “Let us welcome controversial books and controversial authors. For the Bill of Rights is the guardian of our security as well as our liberty.” (link)
Thanks to the librarians and bookstore owners who remind us what’s at stake this week.
Top 40—Under 40
The San Jose Silicon Valley Business Journal just named the top intellectual and managerial talent under age 40 in our community. Congratulations to Jay Rosenthal who made this year’s list. (link) I was lucky enough to hire Jay twice.
There are two important things to know about Jay: first, he’s really smart; second, he’s a Red Sox fan – a highly unusual combination. Nonetheless, we could use more talented young people like Jay in and around local government.
A very interesting attempt to censor a book took place, in part, right here in California this year, when Alan Dershowitz attempted to twist the arm of our very own governor. Apparently the famous lawyer’s commitment to freedom evaporates in the presence of self-interest, as evidenced by his efforts to have Governor Schwartzenegger interfere in the publishing decisions of the University of California Press. In his defense, it must be said that Dershowitz did this only after all his other usual tactics—threatening boycotts and lawsuits—failed. Alas, the poor guy couldn’t scream anti-Semitism because the book he was trying to suppress was the work of a fellow Jew.
Good for Arnold; in the name of freedom of speech, he didn’t give in (however, the pressure did result in the publisher doing some defensive editing and delaying the book’s release by six months). You can read about it many places, here’s one:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dershowitz-Finkelstein_affair
There is no harm in banning books in a society where people are led by a President who openly brags that he doesn’t read.
Except, of course, for children’s books which he manages to accomplish reading upside down, while the country is being attacked.
And while he managed to skim the pictures in “My Pet Goat”, his busy vacation left no time to pick-up an August Memo that, had he read and understood it, might have saved several thousand lives.
So after we ban the books, ban the memos—we don’t want the rest of the World to recognize we have an idiot at the helm.
As my good friend Gordon Reynolds used to say, “you can’t fix stupid.”
Congrats to Jay. Also congrats to Jude who was named one of the potential next great political consultants. I think we can remove the potential and next in that award.
finfan-
Relax. As long as they don’t ban The Turner Diaries you’ll still have something to read.
This might be a little out of the subject but it is related to freedom of speech.
There is an article on Physics Today, September edition, 2005 about Albert Einstein fighting racism in America.
To my surprise and of the writer, that most of Einstein’s lecture on this subject were removed from the rest of the society. Few books had covered this topic and I imagine that any book in the future will not cover this subject either.
The American disease, as Albert Einstein called it, will not be cure if any little controversial issue is censored. I know that it hurt the feelings of the majority but it destroys the woks of great people like Einstein. What a waste of minds.
Now the question is
What good is it to have great writer if they are not going to make it?
We as society should promote censorship to violence and other immoral issues but open door to new ideas.
Every book is a good book.
What do you think?
Evaristo Guerrero II
Let me be your voice.
Boy – still consumed with Fahrenheit 9-11 eh Rich? A movie Goebbels would be proud of.
Anyhoo – I’ll gladly take stupid + some character and integrity any day over ‘smart’ leaders who:
– could parse the word “is”
– refused Sudan’s offer to hand us Bin Laden’s head on a silver platter.
– chased interns around the oval office with his pants around his ankles
But apparently these are very appealing attributes in the eyes of the left – go figure.
PS. Here’s a funny one – apparently Kerry wasn’t the “thinker” he’d have us believe.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/washington/articles/2005/06/07/yale_grades_portray_kerry_as_a_lackluster_student?mode=PF
I would be more worried about important books that are not read because they are not published or, if published, neither promoted nor kept in print (that’s not objectionable censorship, is it?)
It is telling that none of these works on the list hyperlinked that I know, and I know quite a few of them, even the Morrison, Steinbeck, Salinger, and Twain masterpieces so called, are novels that I would miss very much were they disappeared. Philip Roth, E L Doctorow, Tolstoy, Flaubert, and Proust (off the top of my head selection) have written far more disturbing and more influential novels. Those who care to cause trouble about a book just don’t have the wit or the energy to read those authors, I guess.
Let’s not label everyone book burners. Sex by Madonna is on the list. Anyone want to defend that book???
Hey Rich Robinson—
You can criticize Bush, but your guy Gonzales doesn’t read the local daily. He hates the coverage so he tells people he won’t read the Mercury.
Hey Ha Ha (#5)—
I’ve heard of the book but never considered reading it. But thanks for expressing your deep thoughts harmlessly here rather than spray-painting them on the side of a building.
If that loose marble’s got to rattle around mixing things up, better for us that it rattle in your head instead of your spray can.
Hey Below,
That’s the first-time I’ve ever been accused of being a Gonzales guy. That probably would offend Ron more than anything the Merc has written.
Sex by Madonna sold well—it was a coffee table classic.
The rightwing critics dismiss Farenheit 9/11 as a propaganda tool—but no one has countered the facts in it as untruthful or inaccurate.
Truth is sometimes a difficult concept for some.
Novice,
You taking the stupid guy is no surprise.
To learn more about
The scientific society and politics
More books and censorships
Please visit this web site
http://www.physicstoday.org/
Given that we have a 2 party system and given that the democratic party has become so dysfunctional and has gone so far off the rails spells big trouble for the political health of this country.
Hopefully the grown ups in the democratic party are able to purge the 9-11 ninnies like Rich, Unkie Howard, etc and regain control before it’s too late.
Novice is always good for a laugh. Not that the Dems are perfect, but has he ever looked at the Reps?? This is a party of “do as I say not as I do.” Most recent example is the holier than thou Frist—this is a guy who makes medical diagnososes via TV. He also is the latest of the ethically challenged. Of course Novice must think Boy George is a great President but ignores the blood on his hands. How about his choice of a political hack to head FEMA? I guess the loss of so many lives can only be blamed on someone else who is not a Republican. What about a Pres. who makes his decisions not based on scientific fact but on how he personally feels about something, regardless if he can justify it by with any tangible means. The list goes on. Both party’s need work, but the no-bid Reps are destroying the country and leaving a national debt that Dems could never imagine even in their wildest spending days.
Thanks for setting us straight Novice. Hope you don’t have any kids who will be saddled with this debt for their lifetime, or that they are not on National Guard age so they can be sacrificed in Iraq.
I think we agree in principle Joker.
A democratic party on life support and unable to hold the republicans in check is no good for anybody.
Same holds true going in the other direction.
The sooner the grownups in the democratic party take back control from moonbat.org, George Soros, and the Michael Moore true believers, the better off the party and country will be.
Until then, the red states will continue to get redder and the dem. base will continue to crack and wither.
You get the last word.
Jude,
Thank you for your kind words and for hiring me twice.
(Even though the second time was because I had a laptop: http://www.metroactive.com/papers/metro/06.14.01/public-eye-0124.html)
Jay
Jude,
Taking a look at the story Jay linked to, would you say it is fair to say that:
It isn’t usually news when a junior staffer makes the 40 under 40 list…
I guess it follows also that it shouldn’t be news when a senior staffer does NOT make the list.
Ironic
finfan-
I guess you’re waiting for the movie.
To Richard Robinson – none other than Christopher Hitchens has devastatingly “countered the facts in it(Fahrenheit 9/11) as very untruthful and inaccurate.”
http://slate.msn.com/id/2102723/
Read it and weep.
Novice, you sort of redeemed yourself but it’s going to be hard to take you seriously anymore if you continue to defend W. That guy has bankrupted every business he’s ever touched and has done a bang-up job of bringing this country to its knees financially—and he’s not even finished yet. The republicans love to trash the “tax and spend liberals” and yet they spend like sailors and hand out tax cuts to the wealthy. The charts and graphs don’t lie. This country has been led into gross deficit spending by Reagan, Bush and now Bush the sequel and it has taken a Democrat to pull us out every time. In recent times only Kennedy and Clinton have run things without a deficit. What does that tell you? I’m afraid that this time W has gotten us so far into the red that we’ll never recover and will be at the mercy of corrupt governments of China and mid-east oil producing countries, who have become our creditors, for generations. The red states are aptly named. George W Bush will go down in history as the worst thing that ever happened to this country. I’d say the world too, but try as he might, he’s got a little ways to go before reaching Hitler’s level.
Can’t talk now Mark, I’ve got Rich on the phone, he’s going on about Dave Hickey’s link or some such and is needing a ride over to his analysts office so that he can find his happy place.