I've been reading the Great American Novel for the second time.  Now most Great American Novels are accessible to bright teens, or youngsters in their 20s, but I'm convinced that the True And Original Great American Novel, Moby Dick, requires a bit of seasoning on the part of its reader for full appreciation.  At the age of 43, I've been in Ishmael's shoes bouncing between jobs.  I've learned not to judge strange people by first impressions, for therein may lurk a Queequeg.  I've suffered the loss of a number of friends and relatives, and I've felt capital-H Hatred approaching that of Ahab for the white whale.

But I still don't understand how, in the English language, "blast" became a euphemism for "damn", a reference that struck me on my second reading.  Moby Dick, as do many others written before the 1960s, contains a wealth of "blasted" people, "blasted" ships, "blasted" storms, and "blasted" whales.

Oddly enough the blasted whales are not damned.  Herman Melville served aboard a New England whaler, and knew his trade. "Blasted" had a technical meaning with respect to whales:

Presently, the vapors in advance slid aside; and there in the distance lay a ship, whose furled sails betokened that some sort of whale must be alongside. As we glided nearer, the stranger showed French colors from his peak; and by the eddying cloud of vulture sea-fowl that circled, and hovered, and swooped around him, it was plain that the whale alongside must be what the fishermen call a blasted whale, that is, a whale that has died unmolested on the sea, and so floated an unappropriated corpse. It may well be conceived, what an unsavory odor such a mass must exhale; worse than an Assyrian city in the plague, when the living are incompetent to bury the departed. So intolerable indeed is it regarded by some, that no cupidity could persuade them to moor alongside of it. Yet are there those who will still do it; notwithstanding the fact that the oil obtained from such subjects is of a very inferior quality, and by no means of the nature of attar-of-rose.

Moby Dick, Ch. 91, The Pequod Meets the Rose Bud.  A "blasted" whale is one that died of natural causes, floating on the buoyancy of gas produced by decay.  Such a whale was to be picked apart by lesser whalers, the buzzards of the sea.  One imagines that such a whale's gas might be flammable, hence "blasted".

But this in no way explains how "blast" became an omnipresent euphemism for "damn".  "Damn" was, in a quainter era, a very foul word, meaning actual damnation to Hell among people who believed in Hell as a literal place.  But why were the Damned "blasted"?

The euphemism was frequently, and may still be today, used in comic books.  But one can hear it in relatively recent movies such as Dr. Strangelove: Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, and Star Wars.  According to the Partridge Dictionary of Slang, it's a frequent euphemism, also standing in for "bloody", another now quaint term which once had a foul meaning, referring to the blood of Christ.  The earliest reference I can find, according to Webster's, is in the 16th century, but no origin or etymology is provided.

And so I give you a puzzle of linguistic archaeology: How did "blast" become a euphemism for "damn", why did it remain current for so long, and where else in relatively contemporary pop culture can it be found?

Miyamoto Musashi, The Shrike

Politics.

Since ideologies amount to differing ways of defining the world – different accounts of what counts as a fact, as evidence, and as a sufficient definition — ideologies necessarily come into conflict not only in principle but especially in human behavior and interaction. Where ideologies are in accord, disagreement may be worked out in terms of commonly accepted and acknowledged principles of conflict resolution.

Two people committed, for example, to the guidance of formal logic, to empirical data (confirmed to a high degree of probability), and to a foundational set of axiomatic principles have a prospect of settling any disagreements that may arise between them. All such disagreements would be, by definition, a consequence of the incorrect application of logic, incorrect evaluation of data, or misapprehension of axioms. Likewise, two adherents to a particular subset of a particular religion would have greater chances of successful conflict resolution than members of two mutually exclusive faiths would have.

People whose most fundamental interpretive commitments are defined by conflicting assumptions about the nature of experience cannot, in principle, resolve the differences in a way that comports with the conflicting worldviews in question. Thus, pragmatism inclines people to deviate from consistency with their assumptions at least insofar as doing so makes coexistence and a degree of toleration possible. The negotiation of this compromise we call "politics".

Note that while practical matters force a negotiation of conflicting perspectives in terms of compromise, practical matters are not the only cause of compromise. Thus political compromise is interwoven with compromise that occurs for other reasons. For this reason, political thought and action are not reducible to an algorithm.

Politics always involves not merely negotiation but also discord. The discord provides impetus to the protection of ideological and presuppositional interests so that compromise does not lead to self-obliteration. The self-protective impetus of ideological aggression is captured well in remarks made by the seventeenth-century kensei Miyamoto Musashi:

When we are fighting with the enemy, even when it can be seen that we can win on the surface with the benefit of the Way, if his spirit is not extinguished, he may be beaten superficially yet undefeated in spirit deep inside. With this principle of 'penetrating the depths' we can destroy the enemy's spirit in its depths, demoralising him by quickly changing our spirit. This often occurs.

~ Miyamoto Musashi, A Book of Five Rings, trans. Victor Harris, (Woodstock: The Overlook Press, 1974), p. 81. (at Amazon)

Musashi here calls attention to the notion that winning the battle and winning the war are two different and not necessarily concomitant things. Redrawing the geographic and political boundaries which define the dominion of ideologically opposed bodies of people is a compromise which is provisional at best. The impetus for self-definition provides also for other-negation, not necessarily in a violent mode, but always in a mode that removes the threat of self-negation. Miyamoto Musashi's comment is directed toward this idea. If one protagonist in a conflict successfully eradicates the ideological underpinnings of the opponent, the impetus for self-definition is sated, and the threat to self is abated.

It is perhaps most characteristic of politics that, although the goal of self-preservation motivates every negotiation, the rhetoric and intercourse of political participants is not necessarily a rhetoric of violence or conflict. Approchement, appeasement, aggiornamento, détente, sympathy, aggression — all of these terms can characterize political interactions which at their core have the goal not of compromise but of dominion. Says Musashi,

When you decide to attack, keep calm and dash in quickly, forestalling the enemy. Or you can advance seemingly strongly but with a reserved spirit, forestalling him with the reserve. Alternatively, advance with as strong a spirit as possible, and when you reach the enemy move with your feet a little quicker than normal, unsettling him and overwhelming him sharply. Or, with your spirit calm, attach with a feeling of constantly crushing the enemy, from first to last. The spirit is to win in the depths of the enemy. These are all ken no sen (to set him up).

~ same, p. 71.

For good or ill, commitment to a perception of truth always entails hegemony, and denial of truth is itself a commitment that entails hegemony. So, politics is always Kendo, the way of the sword, and ideology determines whether and in what way that sword is metaphorical.

(Note: this piece is from spring of 1994, when the intarwebs consisted of Usenet and Scott Yanoff's list, which was incredibly useful in tandem with Lynx in a world of gophers and Archie.)

There's really no excuse for the fact that we don't have a "SHUT UP!" tag; I shall have to remedy that. After all, "SHUT UP!" is one of our most venerable and consistent themes.

There's a reason for this. The reason lies at the heart of law enforcement methodology in general and federal law enforcement abuse of Title 18, United States Code, Section 1001 in particular.

Imagine this scenario, based on an actual situation:

A business associate calls you and says, "my dear business associate, the shit has hit the fan; Federal Agency X is investigating Project Y we did together. Two Agency X agents are interviewing people."

"Oh coitus," says you, or words to that effect, and terminate the conversation.

Later that day, two well-dressed and polite agents of Agency X visit you. Because you despise me and want me to weep and gnash my teeth, you consent to be interviewed. At some point, they ask you "have you talked about this investigation with anyone?"

"No," you say.

They smile.

At the end of the interview, it occurs to you to ask, "Hey, am I in trouble? Do I need a lawyer?"

The agents smirk. "No," they say. "I mean, unless you lied about talking to anyone about this investigation."

See, you've fallen into a false statement trap, which I've talked about before. The feds know that you've talked to somebody about their investigation. They were probably standing next to your friend when he made that call this morning. And now you've talked your way into a felony.

Here's how it works. The feds identify some fact that they can prove. It need not be inherently incriminating; it might be whether you were at a particular meeting, or whether you talked to someone about the existence of the investigation. They determine that they have irrefutable proof of this fact. Then, when they interview you, they ask you a question about the fact, hoping that you will lie. Often they employ professional questioning tactics to make it more likely you will lie — for instance, by phrasing the question or employing a tone of voice to make the fact sound sinister. You — having already been foolhardy enough to talk to them without a lawyer — obligingly lie about this fact. Then, even though there was never any question about the fact, even though your lie did not deter the federal government for a microsecond, they have you nailed for a false statement to a government agent in violation of 18 USC 1001. To be a crime under Section 1001, a statement must be material — but the federal courts have generally supported the government's position that the question is not whether a false statement actually did influence the government, but whether it was the sort of false statement that could have influenced the government.

Hence, the government's chickenshit false statement trap works — even though the government agents set it up from the start. Now, however weak or strong their evidence is of the issue they are investigating, they've got you on a Section 1001 charge — a federal felony. In effect, they are manufacturing felonies in the course of investigations.

You think this is an improbable scenario? You think I'm talking about rare and extreme cases to color the entirety of federal law enforcement? To the contrary, as a federal defense attorney, I'm encountering this more and more often. Not to sound like an old fart, but we never indulged in such bullshit when I was a federal prosecutor (cue the scoffing from many defense attorneys). But in the last 12 years, I've seen it in a dozen cases, and heard about it from colleagues across the country. It's now routine for federal agents to close out an investigation with a false-statement-trap interview of a target in an effort to add a Section 1001 cherry to the top of the cake.

The lesson — other than that criminal justice often has little to do with actual justice — is this: for God's sake shut up. Law enforcement agents seeking to interview you are not your friends. You cannot count on "just clearing this one thing up." Demand to talk to a lawyer before talking to the cops. Every time.

SHUT UP.

I'm unreasonably chuffed to see that Popehat has made the ABA Journal's Blawg 100. I'm mostly pleased because it puts us in such excellent company. Thanks to Nathaniel Burney at The Criminal Lawyer, who nominated us (possibly as a prank, or as performance art) and had some kind words.

If you're visiting us for the first time through the ABA Journal, you'll find us to be a rather odd lot. We do blog about law — when it moves us. But we're just as likely to blog about politics or art or geek culture.

If you are interested in the intersection of law and the security state, you might enjoy our posts on the TSA or the War on Drugs. If First Amendment issues are more to your taste, consider our posts about SLAPP suits. If law culture is your think, check out posts on lawyers behaving badly or on bad legal marketing. But whether law fascinates you or bores you, don't miss David when he's talking about art, or Patrick when he's in a satirical or social-commentary mood.

Welcome. Don't mind us; we're always like this.

And make sure to check out the rest of the Blawg 100: we are not worthy to be in such company.

What, you might ask, do head shops and Pedobear stickers have in common?

They both help illustrate what law enforcement thinks about "civilians" and about our role in society.

Dateline: Washington D.C. Via Radley Balko, we learn of a police raid on smoke shops, including one called Capitol Hemp. So far, so banal — another pointlessly mastubatory gesture in the financially and socially ruinous War on Drugs. What's notable about this particular raid is that the police, in drafting their affidavit of probable cause in support of a search warrant, argued that display of materials about constitutional rights was probative of criminal activity and criminal intent:

4. While your Affiant was looking at the smoking devices U/C [redacted] observed a DVD that was for sale entitled "10 Rules for Dealing with Police". The DVD gave the following listed topics that were covered as:

A. Deal with traffic stops, street stops and police at your door.

B. Know your rights and maintain your cool, and;

C. Avoid common police tricks and prevent humiliating searches.

Your Affiant notes that while this DVD is informative for any citizen, when introduced into a store that promotes the use of a controlled substance this DVD becomes a tool for deceiving law enforcement to keep from being arrested. The typical citizen would not need to know detailed information as to US Supreme Court case law regarding search and seizure because they are not transporting illegal substances in fear of being caught.

Yes, that's the same 10 Rules publication that we wrote about here last year — an utterly straightforward, inoffensive exposition about protecting your rights (and your safety) when interacting with law enforcement. The video tells people that they have a right — a right set forth in the United States Constitution — to remain silent and to refuse to give consent to searches. Taking a page from modern pro-statist "what do you have to hide?" rhetoric, the police say that a typical citizen "would not need to know" such information and that it is intended to "deceive law enforcement."

Of course, this is utter horseshit. Normal citizens who haven't done a damn thing wrong get arrested and abused and sometimes tased or shot by police all the time. Law enforcement would prefer that you lie back and take it, that you adopt the unprincipled and insipid "law and order" mindset and regard constitutional rights with the suspicion and contempt reserved in popular culture for hippies and ACLU lawyers. Law enforcement loves a servile populace.

The wished-for servility is not restricted to the sphere of constitutional rights. The sort of people who run your government would prefer that you not expose their justifications to the cold hard light of reason or scientific inquiry, either. This is hardly restricted to law enforcement — who hasn't seen a politician who refuses to go beyond his or her talking points in responding to probing questions about policy? But in law enforcement — in the ritualistic invocation of the magic words Think of the Children! — the demand for unquestioning acceptance of moronism reaches its peak.

This brings us to Pedobear.

If you have been on the internet much, you've probably seen references to Pedobear — a crass, semi-satirical, semi-gross reference to pedophilia in culture, sometimes employed to criticize the culture's grotesque sexualization of children, sometimes to make light of abuse. Pedobear is a meme, a reference, an internet in-joke.

At least, that's what people with a clue — people who habitually employ critical thinking — realize.

But law enforcement is notoriously incapable of separating internet memes from reality. That's why some local law enforcement officials have put out "warnings" about Pedobear, suggesting that references to him may denote actual pedophile activity, and that Pedobear stickers are a method for actual pedophiles to communicate with each other. In terms of credulity, this is roughly the equivalent of the Department of Education decrying a startling decline in grammar amongst photographed cats.

In New Mexico, the Attorney General's Office issued such a warning about Pedobear, leading first to gullible media warnings and then to embarrassed and resentful backtracking by the media . In response, Phil Sisneros, communications director for the Attorney General Gary King, wrote the ultimate apologia for stubborn irrationality in law enforcement:

For the record, of course our investigators know that the Pedobear symbology began as an Internet meme joke, poking fun at pedophiles, and yes, we know that anyone who has the bad taste to display a Pedobear symbol is not necessarily a pedophile…emphasis on the word "necessarily." If you are a parent of a three year old, can you really take a chance? This is most assuredly NOT fear-mongering by "well meaning government officials," as one journalist seemed to wonder about. Law enforcement personnel across the country know about Pedobear, they are also concerned. This is the Attorney General's Office simply trying to make New Mexicans aware that the Pedobear symbol is out there and we think the general public, especially those who are not clued in to today's Internet culture, deserve to know what the Pedobear symbol is about and how it is interpreted by law enforcement. Individuals can make their own conclusions as to the relative importance of this information. You don't have to drink the Kool-Aid to know what's in it, right? Lastly, if the Attorney General's Office is lambasted for being too cautious by doing anything and everything we can to help protect children from pedophiles…we're OK with that.

Remember, "it's for the children" — like "remember 9/11" and "War on Terror" — means never having to say you're sorry. It means never having to offer plausible explanations that can withstand rational inquiry. If you don't agree, what kind of parent — what kind of American — are you?

You have rights. Those rights include the right against self-incrimination, the right to be free from unreasonable search and seizure, and a right to think critically. Exercise them — even though a substantial segment of law enforcement thinks that doing so makes you a bad citizen.

Via Instapundit comes the tragic lament of "Rebecca Chapman, who has a master of arts in English and comparative literature from Columbia University" and who "hit bottom professionally last summer when she could not even get a job that did not pay."  In the company of "Willie Osterweil, 25, an aspiring novelist who graduated magna cum laude from Cornell in 2009," and "Rachel Rosenfelt, 26, who graduated from Barnard College in 2009," and other like-minded young'uns, she formed an echo chamber for the palaver of "overeducated, underemployed postgrads willing to work free to be heard on subjects like Kanye West’s effect on the proletarian meta-narrative of hip-hop."

This meditation on optimism from the NYTimes comes on the heels of widespread mockery from rightward pundits of poor, dream-chasing Joe Therrien, who only wanted to be a puppeteer and is now regarded in some quarters as a misfit toy. (Note, though, that Michael Barone, a man of dexter sentiment, defends Therrien, noting that "he presumably felt that he could be a good enough puppeteer to make a living at it and could find a job doing so. That’s the sort of thing the late Steve Jobs told Stanford graduates that they ought to do." The Anchoress also has a thing or two to say in defense of pursuing puppetry, if not paper.

The broad cultural question at stake is whether China has the right idea: to phase out majors and programs that consistently produce graduates who prove unemployable on the basis of their education.

The issue, as always, is the legitimacy and scope of state subsidization. What stake does the government have, in behalf of its citizens, in perpetuating the production of puppeteers (taken as a proxy for the entire class of overrepresented, underemployable domains of interest)?

It's by no means a new theme. Roll back a hundred thirty-odd years, and you'll find Thomas Henry Huxley and Matthew Arnold arguing against and for the humanities with greater eloquence and insight than any of today's pundits. Later, Dewey wanted to regress toward the mean for the sake of making or half-baking a compliant, progressive workforce. His ideas still prompt controversy among Arnoldites, even if Huxleyites and cynics regard the issue as moot.

Do we want to be pragmatic above all else? Is it unwise for the ideal to temper the real? Folks who discern that they're puppeteers or poets, calligraphers or critics, artisans or artists, shouldn't bear blame and suffer disdain for rolling the dice on their dreams. They only merit mockery when, failing, they whine about how their society's public policies didn't long indulge them.

The pursuit of a culture of literary salons is not a path orthogonal to hard-nosed capitalism; when successful, it's a symptom or index of thriving capitalism. And although taking the risk when times are lean may be ill advised, the humanistic goal of chasing a cultural dream isn't inherently wrong or risible. To the contrary, the humanistic goal is the point not only of the risk, but of capitalism itself, rightly construed.