UCSC on Colbert Report

UC Santa Cruz researchers have named a local elephant seal after Stephen Colbert. You can read all about "Stelephant Colbert" in this UCSC press release--humorously titled "I am elephant seals (and so can you!)" Well, the shameless bid for publicity paid off because last night on "The Colbert Report," Stephen led off the show by acknowledging UCSC (sort of) and his eponymous elephant seal:

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Stelephant Colbert the Elephant Seal

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True, Stephen does actually call us the "University of Santa Cruz"; but that's close enough, right? And how about the graphical shoutout to the Santa Cruz Sentinel? This may be the most national exposure Santa Cruz has had since it was "Murder Capital of the World" back in the 1970s.

You know, last year Fosco had tickets for the hike to the beach at Año Nuevo State Natural Reserve to see the mating elephant seals. Sadly, it was pouring rain on that day and Fosco just let the ticket go to waste (as if he would hike two miles in the rain!). Maybe he should try again this year--especially since it no longer seems to rain in Santa Cruz. Imagine the great pix of Stelephant Colbert that he could get (because I'm sure that elephant seals all look very different from each other--just like Jonas Brothers...).

Golden Delicious

"Foodie Friday" continues here at Fosco Lives!

This past week was the annual Bocuse d'Or competition in Lyon, France--a sort of "culinary Olympics" for the best French-style chefs in the world. The competition is named for legendary French chef Paul Bocuse, who with typical Gallic modesty, also lends his name to the eponymous award. Interestingly, the literal translation of bocuse d'or is "golden narcissist," which seems appropriate when you see the winner's trophy:

Yes, that is the actual figure of Paul Bocuse standing atop the globe. In gold. This guy makes Donald Trump look like Mother Teresa.

But despite Bocuse's Rick Warren-like self-regard, the competition is still a deadly serious event, with many European countries following it as closely as sporting competitions. The competition takes place over two days and is something of an endurance test. Each country that participates is allowed one team, led by one chef. This year, the American chef was Timothy Hollingsworth, the sous-chef at the best restaurant in the US, Thomas Keller's French Laundry in Napa. Hollingsworth won the privilege last September and has worked full-time since then with his team to prepare for the competition. Like I said, this is serious.

The New York Times covered this year's competition quite well (how will we live when they no longer exist?). You can watch this short video explaining the competition and describing its strange football-game atmosphere.

If you prefer your culinary competitions to have a bit of a Top Chef twist, then you will definitely appreciate this report from the competition that describes how the first day's ingredient (Norwegian prawns) were given to the chefs frozen. As the Times notes,

“It was the surprise of the day!” said Christian Têtedoie, a member of the official organizing committee, who once won the Meilleur Ouvrier de France, considered the most prestigious cooking award in France. He offered no other comment except to shrug his shoulders, tap his clipboard and walk away.

Eek! What would Tom and Padma say?

The good news is that, unlike previous years, all of the chefs lived through the ordeal. The bad news (for rabidly patriotic Americans like Fosco) is that the American chef, Mr. Hollingsworth, came in sixth. The winner was Norway. Or Sweden. Or something like that. Luckily, you can read about why Mr. Hollingsworth failed. It turns out there was a minor snafu with plating (I told you this thing is serious):

“It was very difficult to plate the fish,” he added. “This was the first time I was with these servers, it was very difficult. They were working a different way from the way I’m used to working.”

He said he was used to plating all the dishes for one course at one time, but his servers at the competition did it in sets of four.

Nor did things go any better for the home team:

The biggest disappointment was felt by France. Philippe Mille, the 34-year-old Frenchman who is the sous-chef at the three-star Paris restaurant Le Meurice, was a strong candidate, and many expected him to win. But his fish dish came out a minute late, which cost the French team 12 points in the scoring.

Sadly, M. Mille will now be deported to Belgium.

Rick Warren Loves God. And Himself. Mostly Himself.

Pompous blowhard Pastor Rick Warren (who, as Fosco has noted, is only getting younger) has been laying low lately, hiding from the roaming gangs of gay bullies who want to prevent his Inaugural Invocation. Warren (seen at right, walking on water) has announced his reticence in a statement explaining that he plans to "let his [Inaugural] prayer speak for itself." That's all well and good, but what else of interest does his statement say?

Well, in case you had doubts, Fosco can assure you that Rick Warren's self-esteem remains intact. As he notes in his statement:

his desire is that his prayer and preaching can be pastoral and that he and President-elect Obama can model civility as men of consequence in these difficult times. [emphasis added]

Wow, somebody sure likes himself. A lot. And it certainly does put all those gays of inconsequence in their place.

You know, it's not like he even needed the phrase "as men of consequence" for the sentence to make sense or read well; but, it's like he couldn't resist

1. equating himself with Obama.
   
2. bragging about his own importance.

Oh Rick, doesn't your bible tell you that the meek shall inherit?

Be My Friend, Anne Hathaway?

Fosco isn't generally that interested in celebrities, unless they are impossibly attractive or do something incomparably stupid. Oh, and he does occasionally enjoy a good episode of "Hey Paula." But he rarely gets the feeling that he would like to hang out with or be friends with any celebrity. And yet, Fosco has been getting this huge friend crush lately for Miss Anne Hathaway. Like so much so that he's starting to think that it might be fun to get stuck next to her on a plane sometime (an idea he got from this story).

Here--I'm just going to say it... I think Anne Hathaway is really cool.

Why is Anne Hathaway so cool? Some reasons:

• She was like a teen role model (in the effortlessly enchanting Princess Diaries movies) who then graduated to showing her ample bosom and serious acting skills in the Brokeback. Not that many actresses have successfully made that transition (case in point). I think it would be fun to go dress shopping with her and joke about her boobs.
  
• She's had some bad luck with men, but she's very funny about it. Her previous boyfriend seems to have dropped the Pope's name to defraud investors (which seems like a bad idea if you are at all concerned about the ultimate destination of your immortal soul). But Anne is very funny about the whole thing, responding to Ellen's recent attempt to fix her up:
  

  "At this point I would just like him to be law abiding."

  That's comedy gold, Anne.
  
• She's really smart. And I don't just mean "Hollywood smart" or "actor smart"--you can aspire to either of those categories just by wearing glasses. No, Anne went to a reputable Seven Sisters college (although not the best one) and also NYU. She was an English and Women's Studies major (two of Fosco's faves). And recently, she used the phrase "process metaphysics" during an award acceptance speech. I don't want to get my hopes up too much, but I'm starting to suspect that Anne and I could have a meaningful conversation about literature.
  
• She's politically engaged, especially when it comes to gay rights. On a red carpet, she recently called out Obama about the Rick Warren thing. And in an interview to promote her upcoming Bridezilla movie, Anne identified her best wedding memory as her brother's same-sex wedding. (In the same interview, she also names one of Fosco's favorite songs, "Maps" by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, as a must-play song for her own wedding.)
  
• Oh, and the best part about her political engagement? She puts her money where her mouth is. As Fosco documented earlier, Anne donated $10,000 to fight Prop 8 (which is a lot of money, really).
  

Now Anne, I'm sure you get this kind of thing all the time, especially from well-read gay bloggers (who are rarer than one might think...), but... well... do want to get a veggie burger at Shake Shack and talk about The Great Bolaño the next time Fosco is in NYC? Fosco will buy.

A Model of Reasonable Debate

You may have noticed that there are occasional disagreements in the Comments between Fosco and his good friend The BeeMaster (not pictured at right). Fosco and The BeeMaster go way back--in fact, The BeeMaster is one of the kindest people that Fosco knows. This may surprise you, as Fosco is pretty leftish and The BeeMaster is a fire-breathing conservative. But, stranger things have happened. In all honesty, Fosco likes to think that his ongoing discussion with The BeeMaster is a pretty nice example of Obama's dictum about "disagreeing without being disagreeable."

Most recently, Fosco and The BeeMaster have been sparring over Rick Warren and Obama. The BeeMaster has taken issue with this Fosco post on Warren and has responded in the comments section to that post. As Fosco was in the middle of a very long response to The BeeMaster's response, he realized that he should just make the whole exchange into a post on the front page of Fosco Lives!. And so here is The BeeMaster's original comment, followed by Fosco's reply. And yes, Fosco will happily append any additional response by The BeeMaster into this post.

THE BEEMASTER'S COMMENT:
When watching the Rick Warren interview in question:

http://www.beliefnet.com/Video/Beliefnet-Interviews/Rick-Warren/Rick-Warren-Interview-On-Gay-Marriage-And-Divorce.aspx

it's a stretch to say he likens gay marriage to incest and pedophilia. In the same interview, he says divorce is a greater threat to the family than gay marriage. So following the same logic would bring us to the dubious conclusion that Rick Warren thinks divorce is worse than incest and pedophilia. Since this is nonsense, one of two things must be untrue. Either Warren doesn't think divorce is worse than gay marriage, OR he doesn't consider gay marriage the same as incest and pedophilia. Watching the interview, it's clear the latter and not the former is the case.

So what's the big problem with Rick Warren praying at the inaugeration? That he opposes gay marriage? Big deal - so does Obama.

The largest group opposed to gay marriage is evangelical Christians. Vilifying Rick Warren hurts, not helps, the cause of gay marriage. It casts its supporters as harsh and (ironically) intolerant. It makes evangelicals fear that, should gay marriage become legal, their churches could be forced to perform such ceremonies or that pastors speaking out against the practice would be accused of hate crimes. Rick Warren specifically mentions this fear as the reason he supported proposition 8. Being smeared for his view makes the point more profoundly than he could ever have.

The BeeMaster


FOSCO'S RESPONSE:
It's true that I feel some ambivalence on this topic. For one thing, I don't think Rick Warren is the worst thing ever. For the most part, he seems like a pretty likable and reasonable guy (and strangely enough, Fosco looks a little like him--although Fosco has more hair). I can see why he's built such a large and successful church. Sure, I'm having a little fun with his hair plugs and the title of his book, but I even do that with people that I like.

And yes, I do recognize that Obama is opposed to gay marriage as well (as the numerous robocalls on my answering machine on November 4 reminded me). I'm not thrilled about that either.

As for the Warren interview in question, I recognize that he views divorce as a much greater threat to marriage than gay unions. Good for him! I wish that point were made more frequently.

However, that interview still includes this exchange:

WARREN: The issue to me, I'm not opposed to that as much as I'm opposed to redefinition of a 5,000 year definition of marriage. I'm opposed to having a brother and sister being together and calling that marriage. I'm opposed to an older guy marrying a child and calling that marriage. I'm opposed to one guy having multiple wives and calling that marriage.

BELIEFNET: Do you think those are equivalent to gays getting married?

WARREN: Oh , I do.

Now Warren is too savvy to use the normally-accepted words for his three examples, but he is clearly talking about
1. incest
2. pedophilia
3. polygamy
And then he explicitly agrees that these three examples are "equivalent to gay getting married." Now none of these may be as threatening to marriage as divorce (presumably because they are all much rarer), but he still makes this comparison (and has had ample opportunity to retract/clarify--especially in this transcript which includes several retrospective Warren clarifications.

So, while Warren's rhetoric may not be as inflammatory as some of the opponents of Prop 8, it's pretty clear that he wants to equate gay marriage with incest, pedophilia, and polygamy.

As for the question of whether Prop 8 would require churches to marry gay couples, I just can't understand how this keeps getting cited. As far as I can tell, every church can determine who they want to marry. Churches can set rules about marriage that go beyond (or even contradict) civil laws about marriage. The one I know best is the Catholic Church, which reserves the right to set all kinds of conditions on marriage. You can't just walk into a Catholic Church and get married. I believe the Mormons are the same. In fact, I suspect that there of plenty of churches in the South that would refuse an interracial marriage (and could legally do so).

Of course, civil authorities are not amused when rogue Mormons try to marry young girls to old men, but that's more of a case of certain child protection laws trumping religious freedom (something that, btw, pretty much all Americans agree on). And besides, that's a case of the State invalidating a religious marriage, not of the State requiring a religion to perform a specific type of marriage.

This is different, I also want to note, from recent cases in Connecticut where justices of the peace are required to conform to the law and marry gay couples. In those cases, justices of the peace are civil, not religious, authorities (although they may also have their personal religious beliefs). Civil marriage is an entirely different thing from religious marriage, and civil officials are required by law to perform any marriage that is legal. Religious officials are NOT required to perform any legal marriage, nor will they ever be.

I think Rick Warren is a smart guy and I just don't believe he is worried that his Saddleback Church will be forced to marry gay couples. He knows the difference between civil marriage laws and religious discretion in the case of marriage. I think he is bringing this up purely as a scare tactic.

As for hate speech argument, I still think Rick Warren is smart enough to know better. He's being cynical here. He knows the difference between hate speech and "politically incorrect" speech. I'm going to use race to make this point. When an old school Southern-fried racist says that Black people are inferior (or that they shouldn't marry white people), that's bigotry but it's not hate speech. Hate speech is speech that is intended to incite violence. So if Warren says that gay people shouldn't get married, he may be wrong (and he may be bigoted), but there is no court in this country that would call that hate speech. Now, if he were to say that his churchmembers should get a baseball bat and "teach gays a lesson," then we'd be in the realm of hate speech.

Now I'll be the first to agree that some gay activists (and, strangely enough, some evangelical conservatives like Huckabee) are trying to elide the distinction between bigotry and hate speech. But even liberal courts know better than to let this distinction slide. For all of the supposed liberal or conservative biases in the federal judiciary in the last twenty years, federal judges are still surprisingly protective of First Amendment rights (for which we can thank the ACLU?). All of this is a long-winded way of saying that, unless Rick Warren plans to call for gay-bashing, he doesn't need to worry about being prosecuted for hate speech. And this is the part that pisses me off: he knows this. He's a smart and sophisticated guy. Or at least, he should know this. Which leads me to the conclusion that Rick Warren is arguing in bad faith.

When it comes down to it, if Rick Warren were just to say "I oppose gay marriage because it goes against my religion," I would have to accept that. I might disagree with him. And I may try to question whether Rick Warren is interpreting the Bible correctly. But I would have to be civil about it. Because, when it comes down to it, Rick Warren would be telling the truth and trying to communicate with me in good faith. And I recognize that Rick Warren does this most of the time. But when he resorts to using scare words and prophesying legal problems that will never materialize, I have to question his honesty.

All that being said, I definitely agree with The BeeMaster's assertion that gay-marriage activists have to deal with evangelical Christians in a constructive way (and Fosco hasn't always done this, I recognize). And I hope this exchange is a step in the right direction.

Next Step: Liposuction!

As Fosco noted in passing in a previous post, there seems to be evidence that Obama's favorite mega-pastor Rick Warren might be living the hair-plug driven life. Take a look at this comparison and judge for yourself:

Rick Warren, circa 2006:


Rick Warren, circa June 2008:


The hair dye is obvious (and so are the contact lenses). But I also think it's pretty clear that his hairline has moved somewhat closer to his forehead. It's not drastic, but it's still noticeable. Alas, it looks like what we have here is a case of garden-variety vanity or pride (wait--isn't that one of the seven deadly... somethings...? I'm blanking...).

Of course, there is also the possibility that this man is actually just getting younger? And if that's the case, I want to worship his god!

A Reasonable Response to an Anti-Gay Inauguration

In case you missed it while you were playing Rock Band 2 all weekend, Frank Rich had an excellent op-ed piece in the NYTimes about the whole Rick Warren inauguration kerfuffle. Fosco, like a lot of gays, has been trying to come to terms with Obama's choice in a way that doesn't minimize its hurtfulness without overplaying its importance (and Fosco will be first to admit that he has yet to find the right balance). Luckily, Frank Rich's column does all of Fosco's work for him.

[Before we begin, I have to know: do the older pictures of Warren (like the one above) raise the issue of whether he's now sporting a hair transplant?]

But back to Rich's column...

One of the questions raised by the Warren choice is that of the extent to which people with repugnant viewpoints should be allowed "at the table" as it were. To what extent can Obama maintain something like a "big tent" of political opinion without actively banishing large sections of the US populace (like the Christian right)? In this case, a distinction needs to be made between "at the table" and "at the head of the table." Rich is right on here:

But there’s a difference between including Warren among the cacophony of voices weighing in on policy and anointing him as the inaugural’s de facto pope. You can’t blame V. Gene Robinson of New Hampshire, the first openly gay Episcopal bishop and an early Obama booster, for feeling as if he’d been slapped in the face. “I’m all for Rick Warren being at the table,” he told The Times, but “we’re talking about putting someone up front and center at what will be the most-watched inauguration in history, and asking his blessing on the nation. And the God that he’s praying to is not the God that I know.”

Similarly, we have to raise the question of the balance between all the good that Rick Warren does (focusing on climate change, poverty and AIDS, for example) and his evil (comparing gay marriage to incest, pedophilia, etc.) Once again, Rich gets it:

Warren, whose ego is no less than Obama’s, likes to advertise his “commitment to model civility in America.” But as Rachel Maddow of MSNBC reminded her audience, “comparing gay relationships to child abuse” is a “strange model of civility.”

Rick Warren may be saying the right things on lots of different issues, but that doesn't change the fact that he has openly lied about gay marriage. It is one thing to say that his religion leads him to oppose gay marriage; it's another thing to raise fear and hatred by comparing gay marriage to the bogeymen of incest and child abuse. Once again, it is possible for us to condemn Rick Warren without condemning all religion.

The other big question here is why Obama, a strong supporter of (most) LGBT rights, thinks this is a good idea in the first place. Hint: there's hubris involved...

Much more to the point is the astute criticism leveled by the gay Democratic congressman Barney Frank, who, in dissenting from the Warren choice, said of Obama, “I think he overestimates his ability to get people to put aside fundamental differences.” That’s a polite way of describing the Obama cockiness.
[...]
When Obama defends Warren’s words by calling them an example of the “wide range of viewpoints” in a “diverse and noisy and opinionated” America, he is being too cute by half. He knows full well that a “viewpoint” defaming any minority group by linking it to sexual crimes like pedophilia is unacceptable.

Obama would love to be able to force a reconciliation between the gays and the evangelicals based solely on the power of his (admittedly commanding) personality. Unfortunately, however, there are conflicts that can't be mended through the power of personality or through the strategy of extreme inclusion. There are indeed issues on which we cannot "all just get along" and these are the issues that Obama, as someone who aspires to some version of progressivism, needs to take a stand on.

Of course, in the end, none of this will really matter much if Obama repeals "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," opposes a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, and works to pass ENDA. On this point, Rich quotes historian Timothy McCarthy:

McCarthy added that it’s also time “for President-elect Obama to start acting on the promises he made to the LGBT community during his campaign so that he doesn’t go down in history as another Bill Clinton, a sweet-talking swindler who would throw us under the bus for the sake of political expediency.” And “for LGBT folks to choose their battles wisely, to judge Obama on the content of his policy-making, not on the character of his ministers.”

If Obama does this, I'm willing to give him a pass on Rick Warren. So now let's get back to Rock Band.

I'm over Obama.

So Barry O has chosen Bear icon Rick Warren to pray at the Inaug. I suppose this isn't a huge surprise, except to those of us who briefly confused the word "progressive" with the word "pragmatist." Realistically, same-sex marriage is still seen as an issue on which it is possible for reasonable people to disagree and Barry is certainly making a fetish of "disagreeing without being disagreeable." Barry is sharp and he knows the best way to "govern from the center" is to kick the gays in the crotch. It's probably the right move politically.

For those of you who don't know, Rick Warren heads the Bareback MegaChurch in SoCal. He's written some book (about marine biology, I think) called The Porpoise Driven Life. He was an outspoken (and mendacious) supporter of Prop H8. Apparently, Rick Warren is some kind of "new evangelical" who is willing to take on climate change and global poverty. That's fine with me, as far as it goes. I guess that's an improvement over some evangelicals.

But at some point, wouldn't it be nice to see the words "new" or "change" applied to a movement that doesn't have the "same" "old" attitude toward the gays?