They always say that famous deaths come in threes (which is a cognitive illusion, but there you go), and the end of 2006 saw three biggies, though of very different sorts — Gerald Ford, James Brown, and Saddam Hussein. Watching the duelling headlines regarding their deaths and memorials has been interesting …<\/p>\n
Jerry Ford<\/strong> was president as I was just becoming aware of politics on my own (rather than based solely on comments from my parents). He always seemed a decent sort, unfairly lambasted for camera-caught clumsiness and for being the most stolid president since Eisenhower. He was a moderate, a compromiser, a consensus-builder, someone who could never have won (and certainly wouldn’t today) the office by election, but also one of the last presidents of the pre-Reagan “we may differ ideologically, While some of his actions were a bit simplistic (though “WIN” wasn’t any goofier than wearing a cardigan sweater in the White House to show how to save energy), his most controversial action was among his first — the pardon of Nixon. Net-net, probably the least-bad solution — but only that. Of the parallel worlds that would be among the most interesting to visit, the Non-Pardon timeline would be high among them, if only to see its effect on government today.<\/p>\n Like the person it was for, the funeral proceedings for Ford have been dignified and relatively low-key. Lots of kind words (and a few harsh ones), lots of stuff centered on his home communities, and a fitting closing of the book for a highly respected representative who backed into being president.<\/p>\n About James Brown<\/strong>, I can’t say much, since his music isn’t my cuppa. The memorials for him have been as ebullient and dynamic as those for Ford have been measured and respectful. His works will live after him in recordings and his fans, and he was far more of a star and performer than 99% of the folks who are given those titles — which is not a bad epitaph for anyone in show biz, if not life.<\/p>\n And then there’s Saddam Hussein<\/strong>, whose hurried execution (at least in the eyes of countries for whom capital punishment is either anathema or something characterized by decades of appeals) seems to have been a disappointing ripple after a turbulent life. There’s been no spontaneous uprising in Iraq from it (despite the best efforts of some to drum one up), nor a laying down of arms and reconciliation. It was as tawdry an affair as one would expect, with plenty of folks behaving badly, I did find vaguely annoying the LAT newspaper article I read about all the people lamenting the execution, for a variety of reasons that seemed quixotic at best — “Well, Saddam might have told us about his hidden money,” “Saddam could have been asked why he stonewalled the inspectors,” “Saddam would have been compelled to testify about why he had my brother shot,” that sort of thing — when clearly Saddam would have said nothing that Saddam didn’t want to say. Protesting Saddam’s execution based on humanitarian, That said, there’s slightly less CO2 in the air now that Saddam is gone, and there’s less likelihood that he will escape and\/or bribe his way out of prison, so in sum I’m not particularly grieving, though I feel like I should, at least pro forma<\/em>. Those who want to see his death as a victory, or as an affront (personal, national, tribal, cultural, or tonsorial) will do so regardless of the fact of his death, or would have found something else to crow and\/or riot about. Saddam was, in many They always say that famous deaths come in threes (which is a cognitive illusion, but there you go), and the end of 2006 saw three biggies, though of very different…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[715,10,15,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime-punishment","category-geopolitical-brouhaha","category-media","category-politics-law"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":610,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2001\/09\/11\/perspective_2.html","url_meta":{"origin":10509,"position":0},"title":"Perspective?","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 11-Sep-01 8:05pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Why am I more affected by 200-odd firefighters and 70-odd police losing their lives than by the almost inconceivable concept of 10,000-plus civilian deaths? I mean, those sorts of 10K...","rel":"","context":"In "9-11"","block_context":{"text":"9-11","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/9-11"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4534,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2003\/08\/11\/grief_can_make.html","url_meta":{"origin":10509,"position":1},"title":"Grief can make you crazy","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 11-Aug-03 10:44am","format":false,"excerpt":"That's the only explanation -- or at least charitable explanation -- for the idea that a family would sue Ford and Firestone for wrongful death. Not, as you might think,...","rel":"","context":"In "ZT & PC"","block_context":{"text":"ZT & PC","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/zt-pc"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":129480,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/01\/13\/guns-and-politics.html","url_meta":{"origin":10509,"position":2},"title":"Guns and Politics","author":"***Dave","date":"Wed 13-Jan-16 8:47pm","format":false,"excerpt":"So ... an interesting correlation between state political leaning and state rate of gun deaths per capita. Mapping Gun Deaths by US States' Political Leanings (2) By analyzing publicly available data on political contributions, Crowdpac's algorithm calculates objective political ideology scores for candidates, donors, organizations... 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Firearms can't be banned [under current Supreme Court interpretation of the 2nd Amendment, as understood by the NRA], therefore\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":37800,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/06\/13\/zomg-white-people-are-dying-out11.html","url_meta":{"origin":10509,"position":4},"title":"ZOMG! WHITE PEOPLE ARE DYING OUT!!!!11!!","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 13-Jun-13 8:53am","format":false,"excerpt":"Actually kind of an interesting set of demographic numbers from the Census Bureau:1. Non-immigrant, non-Hispanic whites in the US decreased in net population by a small amount (deaths outrunning births).2. The majority of births in the US were to non-white demographics.\u00a0Whites (non-Hispanic) are expected to drop in the US from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":131177,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2016\/08\/01\/the-deaths-of-the-last-mammoths.html","url_meta":{"origin":10509,"position":5},"title":"The deaths of the last mammoths","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 1-Aug-16 9:35pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A cautionary -- and remarkably modern -- tale of changing surroundings and ecological damage. The Lonely, Thirsty, Final Days of the Doomed Alaskan Mammoths Scientists finally worked out what killed a group of the creatures stranded for millennia on an island no bigger than Disney World. 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\nbut we can still be friends” era in Washington. <\/p>\n
\nbut after all that … I suspect that everyone, Saddam included, would have been just as pleased if he’d been shot during his fugitive days.<\/p>\n
\nphilosophical, or even pragmatic grounds is arguable; protesting it based on the idea that Saddam would reform and tell all is just silly.<\/p>\n
\nways, last year’s story, or the year before that. Let’s leave him to history.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"