I had a lot to say and frankly I still do, but I am too tired to say it.
I am continuing to make progress on the final version of Cawdor. I finished editing Chapter 5 tonight. Could have pushed on to Chapter 6, that there’s a new scene that needs to be composed for the middle of that chapter and I am not wuite up to it.
Oh, if you have an interest in fashion you might visit the new blog on my blog roll, any second now. It’s run by a friend of mine from my day-job. Pay her a visit.
Continuing off from the recent court ruling on marriage I have a few questions for people who feel that the ruling was in error.
Do you feel that marriage is a fundamental albeit unenumerated right or is it a privilege of government?
If you feel it is a fundamental right, who sort of reasonable restrictions can the state place upon it before the government has overstepped its bounds and intrudes in the exercise of that fundamental right?
Can the State restrict marriage to only mixed-gender couples that are fertile? Force infertile people to substitute a civil union for their marriage?
Can the State restrict marriage to mixed-gender couples of only the same political party affiliation?
Can the State restrict marriage to mixed-gender couples of only the same race? (Yes, Loving vs West Virginia said no the state cannot, but you might feel that was another example of judicial tyranny.)
Can that State restrict marriage to mixed-gender couples of only the same religious preferences?
For my own opinion marriage IS a fundamental right, though it is unenumerated in the US Constitution. Any of the above restrictions are infringements on the exercise of that right, as is the restriction that it can only be practiced by mixed-gender couples.
Yesterday I got the news that award winning actress Patricia Neal has passed away and I resolved to make my Sunday Night Movie The Day The Earth Stood Still.
I have not seen very many films with Patricia Neal, but from what I have seen she was a talented actress of diverse skill and range. The films I know her best from are, of course, The Day The Earth Stood Still, and A Face In The Crowd.
The first film clearly SF and the second very nearly SF. If you have never seen A Face In The Crowd this is a must see movie. A great, absolutely stellar cast, a pitch-perfect scrip and just as relevant today as when it was made.
Back to last night’s movie.
The Day The Earth Stood Still is a classic of SF films, and is a classic of films in general. Made in 1951 it was ahead of the curve for SF films, leading, along with Destination Moon, the charge into SF films of the 50s. Sadly, most of the films that followed were heavy on ray guns, monsters, and adventure and light in the thought and ideas that science-fiction can explore so well.
Very loosely inspired by the Harry Bates short story, Farewell the Master, the movie is about the arrival of an alien, Klaatu, and his robot, Gort, to the planet Earth. Klaatu is greeted with gunfire and suspicion. The alien has a mission and message, but refuses to share it with any one nation or people, insisting that it must be heard by representatives of all the peoples and nations of the Earth.
This of course is impossible in a world divided between the United States and the USSR. Frustrated by terran stupidity, Klaatu eascape his captivity to learn more about humans and their fears firsthand.
What follows is in part a message film, in part a lovely look at the Earth through alien eyes, and in part a manhunt. (Or an alien-hunt if you prefer.)
I have problems with the specific message delivered in the film, but that’s okay. It’s a wonderful story, wonderfully told. I am not as allergic to ‘smug aliens’ as some of my friends are.
Of course if you have never seen this movie, I urge you to rent it. I own it on Blu-ray and the effects hold up very well for a film nearly 60 years old.
DO NOT see the remake. There is no remake. I refuse to acknowledge it.
Without commenting on how I feel about either of these two Senatorial candidates, I have to say that this ad is exquisitely damaging like a prison shiv between the ribs.
Using the opponents voice from his audio book is a masterful stroke.
Again please do not infer a position from myself between these two candidates, I am in awe of the skill of the ad, not in the positions of either of these men.
So if you have been following the news then you know a Federal Court ruled that the recent change to the California State Constitution defining marriage as only being between a man and a woman is unconstitutional under the United States federal constitution.
I applaude this ruling.
I know that there are many many people who do not, and I will not speculate or denigrate their motives here. My position is that movement towards greater individual liberty is generally a good thing and that movement towards less individual liberty is generally a bad thing.
(Please take note of that word GENERALLY, in the sentence. It is there for a reason. There are exceptions and remember that before you start listing something like healthcare trying to imply I am inconsistent.)
There are and will be of course those who decry this an tyranny from the bench. That the will of the people were overruled by a black-robed jackbooted thug who committed the worst of all judicial crimes — activism. I would be more sympathetic to there arguments if they ever raised the specter of activist judge on a judge who had ruled in their favor. Activism is always found where the judge ruled against your side, not on your side itself.
(Wanna prove me wrong? List three cases that you think should be overturned because the judge was activist, but where what you personally liked — outcome-wise — had been the result.)
The will of the people? That always come second to the protections of the United States Constitution. If Californians passed a change to their constitution outlawing the private ownership of all firearms I hardly think these same objectors would be citing the ‘will of the people’ as a reason to not overturn the law. They would be right because the US Constitution enumerates the right to bear arms in the Bill of Rights.
Ahh, but people are fond of saying that any right they don’t agree with isn’t enumerated in the Bill of Rights and therefore is not a right at all.
Poppycock.
I give you the 9th amendment to the Constitution and part of the Big Ten Bill of rights.
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Certainly I consider the right to marry as an unenumerated right. It is not a privilege, it is a right that the government can restrict only with good cause. Where the state has a compelling interest. (Such as incest which produces deformed and disabled offspring a burden on the state and society.)
Judge Walker — a G.H. Bush appointee — found that the state had no compelling interest in restricting marriage to only mixed gender couples and that such restrictions violated the 14th amendment.
I applaud him.
My headache continued into Monday and by mid-day it had blossomed into a migraine. I went home early from work, tried to sleep. (Failed because of repair work being done to the unit above ours.) Still by 5pm thee migraine had subsided into just a regular headache.
In the evening I visited our local speciality bookstore, Mysterious Galaxy, for the first meeting of a writers’ workshop group there.
Wow, there were something on the order of 23 people. I suspect we’ll have a fairly steep die-off before we settle down into a stable workshop. (Hopefully I will not be one of the die offs.)
TTFN
But I’ll share a couple of tid-bits of information.
One: The 2010 remake of the Crazies. Not a bad film, held together fairly well, went more for suspense and thrilled than gore — a good choice – nice characters and only a little bit of the Scooby-Doo at the end.
Two: Having a headache so not much writing, but I am continuing to make progress, just slowly.
Three: Got as copy of Planet OF The Vampires off eBay for $5. (Thanks Melissa!)
Sorry I have been away a few days, nothing major just busy and enjoying regular sleeping again. I’ve started passing chapters over to my sweetie-wife for final copy-edit. I hope to have a beta-read version of Cawdor finished in about 4 weeks.
I spotted this bit of good news over at Digital Bits. It looks like visionary Director Guillermo Del Toro, (Hellboy, Hellboy 2, Pan’s Labyrinth, and more.) will be making his dream project, an adaptation of H.P. Lovecraft’s, At The Mountains Of Madness. It is also reported that James Cameron will be producing. That puts real muscle behind the movie. (And if you saw the American version of Solaris you also know that Cameron is willing to let a director be while acting as producer.)
So today they came and took away the blowers and the heaters (And part of the wall and the ceiling as well.) So hopefully tonight I will be able to sleep properly.
I have had a headache of some kind or another for two days now — perhaps three it is hard to tell — and I hope that a good night’s sleep will put me back in the right.