Louder Fenn

I won't be posting very heavily for a week or so. I've got Some Stuff to do. I promise (seriously and completely) to wrap up my children's fantasy essay as soon as I return in full force. Conveniently, my brother seems to be in a blogging mode, so this blog should not become boring in the coming days. But you know how blogging goes: sometimes it goes; sometimes it doesn't; and considering the unreliability of BlogSpot these days, it may all be moot...

The Spare Midge
Modicum 22

The stutter in the lace had never ended. Even out in Nomads Field, I had felt it: the sort of noise, a kind of ache, that you soon ignore. As we neared the palace, the stutter worsened.

And then, in the palace, I could hear the wail.

I wondered if Egg's viruses were taking hold. Egg said they might not, not right away. They were sneaking into the co-Am on the minions but they still had to work through the co-Am's guts. Besides, every minion carried only a probability of the viruses. "Heck," Egg had said, shrugging, "it's in the nature of the lace to carry Midge's data — and Ursula's co-Am happens to, um, mesh with that nature — but the viruses are unnatural, as far as the lace is concerned. They're an imposition, and interquantic imposition is not exactly determinate. It'll take time — and tons of minions — for the probabilities to maximize."

Midge, still tranquil, walked ahead of me.

Since visitors to Rock might arrive at any time and might leave within an hour, the palace was always open, and even now, early in the fake morning, there was a line of mourners. Midge joined it and let it take her along. This was, of course, the best way to get as near as possible to Ursula, and to be near her as long as possible, without appearing suspicious.

I was not beside my sister. Egg had told us to separate ourselves, to put maybe fifty people between us. We had to give the minions room to get confused. Making the gap was a little tricky, though, since I had to wait behind, out of the line, counting mourners, ten, twenty, thirty, and not look like I was waiting. Pardon me, Miss, but what are you waiting for? I doubt that the tree-laced mercenaries and robot cannon really cared about some quiet little thirteen-year-old girl, who was surely waiting for her parents or older sister; but I knew what I was doing, I knew I was a kind of threat, and so I didn't want to seem a threat.

Thirty, thirty five, forty. Of course we didn't have to be exact. But after a while, the counting was a game. By counting mourners I wasn't merely the Other Half of the lace's singularity. I was participating in this act. My sister and I were up to something.

Forty one, forty two.

We were playing.

Forty three, forty four.

Midge was closer to Ursula. The clarity of the co-Am was painful now. So many minions were confused. I pleaded with the viruses to finish. To distract myself I counted more intently. Forty five, forty six, forty seven. Midge's tranquility helped against the pain.

As did her words.

By the lace she was chatting with me. She didn't usually chat by the lace, even if she was out of earshot. Midge had never wanted the lace to think that it belonged in her life. She might take advantage of it, now and then, to throw me a comment or two, but she would never dignify it with extended monologues. Except, that is, when she didn't want Mother to hear her. But now, in the atrium of Portia's Third Palace, Midge wasn't griping or scheming or lamenting things. She was pointing out the people around us, their hats, their shorts, their bags, their faces, their dirt, their glow, not to mock them, no, but just because, well, there they were, you know, and, wow, weren't they something?

Forty eight. Forty nine.

Midge turned to look at me through the crowd. I saw myself still back there, waiting, and suddenly she grinned and waved at me, deep in her contentment I saw her lightly wave, while, by the lace, I heard her call out to me, Hey, sis, are we having fun yet? — and, through the crowd, I saw the bewilderment in my eyes, for she had never called me sis before.

Then everything ended.

Ó 2002 Louder Fenn

I forgot to finish my thought on federalism: However, given the state of the Commerce Clause, we should not be afraid to enact a mere law to ban cloning simply because a proper constitutional scheme would not allow it. There are so many trivial laws proposed and passed based on Commerce Clause authority, that it would be an abdication to not enact an important bill because of theoretical objections. The federalism objection --while fair, given the conservative position on the issue -- is really just a weapon wielded by cloning proponents to put anti-cloners off balance. It should be given a respectful nod and brief response, followed by extended anti-cloning rhetoric.

-Jimmy Tomato

Federalism and cloning: Louder is right that cloning is of sufficient moral import that we should have a national policy (also because if one state allows cloning, all the research facilities will move there, undermining the point of a ban). As to the constitutionality, I do not know what grant of power the proposed ban relies upon -- the Commerce Clause, presumably. If so, the problem is with Supreme Court precedent that mangles the Commerce Clause into something just short of a grant of full police power to the feds. Therefore, the Supreme Court should overrule its Commerce Clause jurisprudence and restore some sanity to the balance between the federal government and the states. Then, we should enact a constitutional amendment banning cloning -- because the theory of federalism should not stand in our way, but the text of the Constitution, as it stands, probably should stand in our way but does not because of wacko Supreme Court precedent. Unless someone can come up with some other clause in the Constitution besides the Commerce Clause on which to hang a ban?

HokiePundit wishes that I would provide an e-mail address and/or a way for readers to post comments. Sorry, Hokie. I deliberately forwent both because I already spend too much time reading my favorite blogs (like Hokie's) and posting to my own blog. If I had to read and respond to e-mails and comments, too...! Because I know I would never do it, I didn't want to implicitly promise I would.

Maybe someday I'll provide an e-mail link, if I can think of a polite way of declaring: You can write if you want but don't expect a response.

Bryan over at JunkYardBlog pointed out this article on cloning by Charles Krauthammer. I'm kind of pleased that Krauthammer ultimately uses -- as his strongest objection to cloning -- the argument that manfacturing humans for disposal is dangerous.

Creating a human embryo just so it can be used and then destroyed undermines the very foundation of the moral prudence that informs the entire enterprise of genetic research: the idea that, while a human embryo may not be a person, it is not nothing. Because if it is nothing, then everything is permitted. And if everything is permitted, then there are no fences, no safeguards, no bottom.

Since I have often made this point about "manufacture of humans," I'm tempted to say advantage Fenn! -- but, really, I'm much too humble.

Now, obviously I don't agree with Krauthammer that the embryo is merely "not nothing." Still, it is good that his voice is substantially with us. And did you know that Krauthammer is a member of the President's Council on Bioethics? In other words, he is a Minion of the Dark Lord Leon Kass. Yes indeed, that Council is nothing but a gaggle of unthinking Luddites.

P.S. I told myself I'd never say "advantage Fenn." It does lack humility. Still, it is so fun to say!

Hmph. I did not realize how long my half-response to Bryan would be. Guess that explains why a full response was going to take so long.

-Jimmy Tomato

Instapundit excerpts his own article, saying that by seeking a national solution (i.e., a ban) on cloning, Bush is being a "fair-weather Federalist." While Reynolds' general point is valid -- not everything is a Federal issue -- it seems to me that cloning is of sufficient depth and import that a Federal solution is called for. Would Reynolds object to the national banning of slavery? Or would he leave that up to the states? He might reply: "Well, at least they made an amendment to the Consitution." Fair enough. So if we who oppose cloning seek such an amendment, will the "fair-weather Federalist" argument end? I myself don't think that an amendment is called for: To a large extent, the original Consitution tolerated slavery and would therefore have required amendment prior to any national banning of slavery; unless one is going to start talking "penumbras," I don't think the current Constitution has much to say about cloning...

You bloggers are crazy. I tried writing a comprehensive response to Bryan's post about guitars in church, but was stymied by the amount of time it was obviously going to take. The partners at my firm will fire me without a second thought if I submit my billable hours with twelve percent devoted to some client called "Blog." So, while it goes against my grain to offer only half a response, here goes:

Using the Psalms to justify guitar music is a bit of an overreach. There are a lot of steps from three-thousand year old harp music to Innagoddadavidda. No mention of "outside church": true, but no mention of in church. No mention of guitars. Maybe we should only be using harps? Maybe only playing three-thousand year old cymbals? Etc., etc.

The simple fact is that absent a more clear-cut command to use guitars in church from the Psalms, I do not believe that God intended for us to suspend our judgment regarding music and art and cut loose with some rockabilly in church because David wrote about praising God on the timbrel.

I am not foreclosing different forms of music -- I'll try a mass with Arvo Part any day. I simply and graphically stated that the guitar music one hears in church today is bad music. This is an opinion, but only insofar as all judgment about art is opinion. Some artistic judgment is valid or else we are left blessing the recent "art" exhibit that made the news rounds that consists of cadavers cut open and manipulated into various positions by the "artist."

Now, I also said that guitars as such should not be in church, and I will stick with that, too. There is a spirit to different sorts of music, there is a spirit to different instruments. And I am saying the spirit of the guitar is not suitable for church. It is like the traditional "Queen of the May" song that Catholics would sing at the May crowning of a statute of the Blessed Virgin Mary: I like the song, but it is sounds remarkably like an old Irish bar song. Fine song, not right for church. Guitar sounds good -- not right for church.

Finally, I do not believe that we should all find the church that suits us, per se. I believe that church should universalize -- take the best that mankind has to offer and offer it, so that we may pray as one. Church is a public prayer -- it should seek the highest common denominator. It should not splinter into little churches, each offering what a tiny and discrete minority enjoy. While it does not keep me up at night that some people use guitar music in church (or other things I believe to be problematic), I also do not believe that it is proper that everyone just find what suits them and let 'er rip.

-Jimmy Tomato

The Spare Midge
Modicum 21

Although Egg had run simulations in the ship's Am, the only real test of his plan was to do it for real. Of course he wanted to know how it went. He was tempted to tap us both through subdermal monitors, but he was afraid of being detected. We were taking enough risks as it was. So he told us we had to come back, to tell him if everything worked.

We told him we would. Midge was even sincere.

Lin asked us if we really wanted to go through with all this nonsense. I don't think she was having second thoughts, not as such. She had faith in Egg's contrivances. And by then I think she had convinced herself that our intentions were pure enough to merit Portia's mercy, should something go wrong. And as she had said, several times already, who was she to stop the foolishness of youth? But she had to try to dissuade us, at least a little. She was a mother, after all.

Midge, however, was ready to go through with anything. She wasn't cautious to begin with — and the fractional Am had made her far from anxious. As for me, I was determined to go through with this.

Lin wished us well. Egg did, too.

We never saw them again. I don't think they ever got in trouble because of us. I never heard, though, one way or the other.

• • •

We walked back to the train station.

Once or twice, Midge was disoriented. She wasn't sure what to do with herself. The smear with the Am had diverted her. She had no inclination to be herself.

We didn't bother with breakfast. We didn't return to the hotel, change our clothes, see the monkey, plan our day.

We took the train to Ursula.

Midge and I sat beside each other. The seat was a narrow bench, only large enough for us, really, but a small man with square glasses had taken the aisle, Midge in the middle, I at the window. Midge used to think that she could turn the eye of any man, but this man was indifferent. He was taken instead with the scrolling words on his paper loop and probably hadn't noticed Midge's leg against his. To him, I suppose, we were nothing more than the usual morning cargo.

Midge was indifferent, too — and not only because the man was limp in his suit and tie. Men, boys, all of that and every toxic excess, were nothing to her now. She was oddly tranquil. She stared at the fabric of the bench in front of her, at the chrome trim, at the Amjacks and the bright, insistent commercial patches, and enjoyed the slowness of her own breathing. She knew, I knew, that the fractional Am had modified her. Her tranquility was no less real. Egg, I think, had identified our problem well. To save Ursula's co-Am he hadn't defined happiness as cheer or joy. Happiness, for our needs, was peace.

Contentment.

I was not so content. Back in the Sling, when Midge and I had first left for Rock, I had felt the promise of a far place. Now I felt it again, an unspecific hope, a rising of sorts, no name to it but there. I was excited. Oh, yes, Mother thought me dull. Midge thought me dull. Everyone did. I did. I was dull. I was never a fervent child. Yet in a corner of my heart lived the Battle Queen of Midge's wishes, a fancy that had never died but slowly condensed, becoming a pearl, a burning coal, a misplaced heat...

I did not expect anything to come of our adventure with Ursula's co-Am. We would end its wailing and then — and then, I didn't know. But we were doing a favor to Ursula herself, she who had collapsed Rigel, tricked a worldrot, snared the interstatial armies of the Paavaka Usurper, shifted the asteroid ring of the Neo-Anarchists two seconds into the past (and out of the present), suffused the buildings of Gollidor with an Am-twisted, aether-borne hatred of people (causing them to de-mortar themselves and crush the Gollidorian rebels), surrendered her own hand as ransom for the Prince of Falwick (only to use it later as a pummel on the Regent), lured the Sixth, Ninth, Eleventh, and Twenty-Fourth Fleets of Kawai Ellowean between the double pulsars of Qent (creating a mass-threaded wormhole that swept the Jaca refugees to safety) — done all these things, done more, done more than I or Midge could ever have done; but at least my sister and I could do this, walk into Portia's Third Palace and evade all the defenses and give Ursula Kato a touch of our adoration, a favor if not exactly to her then to her intimate servant, her co-Am, the last living piece of the Goddess.

Midge and I could finally, truly join the Tale of the Glorious Axe.

Ó 2002 Louder Fenn