Peter Arno, chronicler and satirist

Peter Arno. Peter Arno (1979) Introduction by Charles Saxon. Peter Arno documented the upper middle and upper classes of New York, city and State, in several hundred drawings, 248 of which are reprinted in this book, most of which were drawn for The New Yorker. He originated and refined several of the stereotypes that we still instantly recognise as symbols of excessive money and power, and of a lifestyle that has changed only in its outward show. He was himself born into this class; this insider status lends his observations the look of authenticity.
     I’ve always liked Arno’s drawings. Perusing this book for the 3rd or 5th time, I admired again the accuracy and subtlety of his line. He never uses two lines where one will do. Half a dozen lines combind into a profile show us a complete character, as in an irate 60-something man glaring at the grinning face of some TV huckster. The back cover shows a superbly elegant young man complimenting his hostess: “You do give such perfect parties, Alice. Is there anyone here you’d like to meet?”
     This time, I noticed more satiric bite and rage than I recalled from previous readings. One cartoon shows a lion tamer raising his whip against a lion lying cowering on its back. An old lion says, “If only I were twenty years younger and had my teeth!” A comment on animal rights? Yes, and an allegory on human rights, too.
     Well worth getting your hands on if you can find a copy. ****

Poirot Hunts a Serial Killer: The A.B.C. Murders

Agatha Christie. The A.B.C. Murders (1936) Poirot receives a letter announcing a murder, and taunting his ability to discover the killer. The police aren’t convinced, even though the murder happens as advertised. Three more letters and killings follow, which solid police work (mostly off-stage), and Poirot’s usual ability to rearrange the puzzle pieces so that they all fit, lead to satisfying solution. One of Christie’s best puzzles, but at this remove her inability to create fully rounded characters is painfully obvious. There isn’t even any advance in the backstory of Hastings (returned from Argentina for the occasion) and Poirot.
     I reread the book because of the 2018 TV series starring Malkovich as an elderly Poirot. That series omits Hastings, and makes several other major changes in the plot, which, with additions barely hinted at in Christie’s version, give us a darker and more plausible psychology of the criminal and his victims. Poirot’s success does not please him, since it comes at a cost of four lives and a blight on at least three others.
     Still, the book was entertaining enough. **½

Econ 101: Market Failure.

Econ 101: Market Failure

On a radio talk show this morning (June 14, 2020), I heard a guest use the phrase "The market didn't work as it should".

Where, pray tell, is it written that the market should work in any particular way? It's quite obvious to me that the market simply works as it works. There is no "should" about it. Unless you adhere to Neo-liberal economics, which has more than a whiff of elitist arrogance about it, and with its indifference to human psychology clearly implies that if only people behaved rationally, the world would unfold as it should, rewarding the right people with riches, and punishing the wrong ones with poverty.

And how does the market actually work? It aggregates human choices, is all. Left to itself, "the market" demonstrates that human desires, whims, greed, ignorance, powerlust, etc drive buying decisions far more often than rational self-interested understanding of the long-, medium-, or even short-term consequences of those decisions. When the unpleasant consequences appear, the Chicago School refers to "market failure".

"Market failure" is in fact the Chicago School's failure to account for reality.

The market never fails. It shows us what we believe is important. Important enough to spend money on, anyhow. Too often, those beliefs are mistaken. And that's a polite way to say it.

The US President: An Elected Monarch

The American President has the following powers (some with the "advice and consent" of Congress):

a) Propose legislation
b) Pardon felons
c) Issue edicts ("executive orders")
d) Conduct foreign policy and make Treaties with foreign powers
e) Veto or adopt legislation passed by either or both Houses of Congress
f) Appoint Officers of the State
g) Act as Commander in Chief of the armed forces

This makes the American President an eighteenth century King in all but name.

When the Founders of the United States composed the Constitution, they had a problem: How were the Powers of the State to be exercised, and by whom? The models of governance that they knew all had Rulers. A Ruler is both Head of State and Head of Government. Since the Founders knew that Rulers tended to morph into Tyrants, they saw their problem as that of limiting the power of the Ruler. And since the popular assemblies tended to replace law with current popular prejudice, they had to limit the power of Congress. And since Judges could make arbitrary rulings, they had to limit the powers of the Court. Hence the "three-legged stool", in which  Congress (which represented the People), the Supreme Court (which represented the Law), and the President (who represented the State) were set up to limit each other's powers.

So far, it's worked quite well. But as Mr Trump's Presidency shows, there was a weakness: The Constitution combines the roles of Head of Government and Head of State. This gives a rogue President the ability to ignore the checks on his power, especially when a political party sees him as an agent or instrument of their special agenda. No Ruler has ever been willing to be a mere instrument of some constituency, although they have been more than willing to use that constituency to acquire and consolidate power..

The irony is that while the Founders erected a Republic with an elected monarch, the hereditary monarch of the United Kingdom had already lost almost all the powers of a King. The  Declaration of Independence refers to the tyranny of the King, but it was Parliament that denied the Colonies their rights. It was Parliament, controlled by landowners and merchants, that saw the Colonies as both a source of raw materials and a market for their surplus goods. That  these factions were developing a party-controlled Parliament could also have served the Founders as warning. The Constitution makes no mention of political parties, and hence contains no mechanisms for controlling them.

The final accountability in America rests with the People, who every four years must elect their President, legislators, and other officers of government. In the long run, the People will choose freedom and responsibility, but in the short run they will often choose oppression and  licence.

Terry Fox (Repost)

Some time ago, sitting in the waiting room at the Health Center waiting for blood to be sucked from my arm for a PSA test, I saw Terry Fox's picture on the cover of an old Maclean's Magazine.

I remembered the time I saw Terry run.

I was on the way to the Sudbury airport to catch a flight to Toronto in order to attend a meeting that at the time seemed important, but whose purpose I have long since forgotten. The bypass had not yet been built, so I was driving through a light rain along the old two-lane road. Near Lively, the traffic slowed down. I saw flashing police lights ahead and thought, O damn, an accident, that'll make me miss my flight. And braked to a stop.

Then I noticed that the police car was approaching me, its red and blue lights reflected in the water lying on the pavement. Behind it I saw Terry Fox. I knew immediately who he was, even though his van was some 50 yards behind him. He shifted his weight onto his good leg, made a skipping hop, threw his prosthesis in front of him, and used it as a pivot to bring his good leg over to the front again. His good leg hit the pavement, and he raised himself again in that skipping motion to lift the prosthesis off the ground and bring it to the front again.

Step, skip, swing. Step, skip, swing. Step, skip, swing. He came towards me, step skip swing, step, skip, swing, step, skip, swing. I began to imagine how many times he must have done that since he'd left the East Coast. Thousands of times, tens of thousands of times. And wondered how his leg stump could stand the pounding. How the heel of his good foot could tolerate the repeated thump into the asphalt. How his back could take that twist and lift needed for each step.

My line of traffic began to move again, and I briefly saw Terry's face as he step-skipped past me. A couple weeks or so later we heard that he had to stop near Thunder Bay because the cancer had come back. I thought, He knew it even then, in Sudbury That was not just physical pain that marked his face, it was fear that he might not finish his run. I knew then that I had seen courage in his face.

Before I saw Terry, I'd dismissed his run as mere publicity hunting. Then I saw him. I saw that Terry knew he wouldn't make his mark as the rest of us have done, in our work, in our families, in our communities. He would never succeed at any career. He would never be proud of his children. He would not earn the respect of neighbours and friends. Because he wouldn't live long enough.

He could have waited for death, he could have worked with the doctors to delay it for as long as possible. No one would have faulted him for doing that. But he felt the need to do something worthwhile. What could he do? He had no skills, no special talents, no training or education. He had only his body and his determination. So he did the only thing he could do.

He used his body, he used himself, to draw attention, to enlist the rest of us in the struggle to understand the disease that was killing him, and would kill many others, and continues to kill.

Terry used himself up in doing this. He died doing this.

Every time we drive west through Thunder Bay, we stop at the monument beside the highway, and I remember. We stopped there again a few years ago. I sat and looked up at his face, a face that I remembered from a brief glimpse in the rain, and I noticed that people spoke softly as they read the inscription and gazed at the statue of Terry Fox.

What if you were the only one capable of lying?

 The Invention of Lying (2009) [D: Ricky Gervais, Matthew Robinson. Ricky Gervais, Jennifer Garner, Jonah Hill) In Mark’s world, no one lies. Everyone tells the truth, and nothing but the truth (but not, thank the man in the sky, always the whole truth). A pretty dreary and morose place. Then Mark discovers he can “say what is not.” He uses his newfound skill to first make loadsadough and then to comfort his dying mother with a tale about “the man in the sky”. That story gets away from him. He woos Anna McDoogles, who wants a genetic match so that she can have nice skinny blond kids. True love wins in the end. The script includes a number of well-considered satiric jabs at the credulity of humankind, but sadly the full potential of the core idea is not, I think, developed. This is one of those rare stories that would work better in print than it does on screen.
     A competent job by all concerned, good for an hour and a half or so of mildly amusing entertainment. **½

Another Dickson anthology: Ancient, My Enemy

Gordon R. Dickson. Ancient, My Enemy (1974) Another selection by Dickson. The title story tells of conflict between an intelligent alien species and the human colonisers. The planet suffers terrible day to night temperature changes, the aliens are cannibals (because there’s very little plant life), and have a culture of individual violence. This does not end well.
    The other tales are mostly ones I’ve read either in their original magazine publication or in later anthologies. Rereading them was a treat. This collection is essential for a Dickson fan, and a good intro for anyone else. Dickson’s aliens are better imagined than most, although (like any SF writer) he creates then by pushing some human traits to extremes. He’s less reliable as a builder of planets. Their climates and ecosystems are always some part of Earth’s climate and ecology spread over a whole globe, which doesn’t make sense. Nevertheless, his stories are satisfying. *** to ****
This will be last Dickson review for a while.