Semi Truths

a semi-regular column of Truths, Half Truths, and Mostly Truths by Semi.

Volume I, Issue 8 · posted March 23, 2001

MAD COWS AND ENGLISHMEN

Following in the proud tradition of columnist-as-crank (thank you, OSohRose), there is a little part of me that is disappointed that we are unlikely to see "Mad Cow Disease" here in the states. Otto von Bismarck once said (I'm paraphrasing) "politics is like sausage, it is best not to know too much about what goes into the making of either." Well, as it turns out, the beef industry is also like sausage!

Bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or "spongy cow brains" (yummy) has been linked to supplying cattle with feed made up of ... ground up cows! Now, I'm not a vegetarian, but guess what ... cows are! This sounds more like a mad science experiment than a carefully considered nutritional supplement. "Let's feed some hamburger to a cow and see what happens. Look out, he's going nuts!"

Not surprisingly, with the spread of this disease, Europe is in a panic and many nations are seriously rethinking that whole "European Unity" thing as they rapidly close off exports of beef from suspect countries. 

Why do I say I'm disappointed that this won't happen here? Because in a country that is uniformly overweight and in which high blood pressure and heart disease is a leading killer of adults, it seems to me that we could afford a little panic about beef. A little less overall saturated fat and more exercise would do our whole nation some good, and we can go back to dying the natural way, by becoming infected with the West Nile Virus and eating genetically engineered corn.

Fortunately, for those less macabre than I, in 1997 the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) established a rule prohibiting the use of most animal-derived protein in feed given to cud-chewing animals, such as cows, sheep, goats, truck drivers, and outfielders.

Which means we will be spared the scene I had in mind for my remake of the Charlton Heston film in which we see an enraged cow running amuck in the overcrowded streets of New York screaming: "It's cows! Bovine Green is cows!"

THIS SPACE FOR RENT

Speaking of thirty year old science fiction flicks, do you remember this scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey?

The splendid space station glides majestically high above the planet to the tune of Strauss's Blue Danube Waltz. It is a magnificent construct, a massive ring spinning joyously free from the confines of Earth. The sun gleams off the steely skin, the bright beams reflecting hypnotically. As the music swells, the entire structure points downward and grandly, inexorably, rips through the atmosphere and explodes into a flaming mass over the ocean...

Of course not. When Stanley Kubrick and Arthur Clarke offered their vision of the future over three decades ago, they imagined a world where giant stations hovered continuously over head, and going to the moon was no more complicated then catching the red eye the Pittsburgh. It was a grand prophecy.

This was the future I imagined, the vision I grew up with (okay, so they also had insane computers killing astronauts and giant fetuses floating in space, but that misses the point...). So in this first week of spring, the year 2001, it was with a mixture of awe and horror that I watched the news reports of the  Russian space station Mir being brought to an ignominious end over the South Pacific. It would have been soo cool to hear that, just as the booster rockets fired to bring the 140 metric ton outpost to its ultimate demise,  the abandoned complex inexplicably broke free from orbit and launched itself into space with one final message : "I'm sorry Dave, I can't let you do that..."

I GET LETTERS...

You didn't think I could get this far without mentioning the "President" did you?

In response to:

“...I read the political stuff with pleasure also but do think our President is the President, not the `President´. No matter the circumstances of his election or how reactionary or even dumb he might me, his position deserves respect.”

(from Semi Truths Vol. 1, Issue 6: "Hearts of Darkness")

Another reader pointed out:

1) You haven’t said anything terrible like Bush should be shot or anything.

[ True. I have absolutely not said that Bush should be shot. ]

2) Everything you’ve said about him is true (not just semi).

[ Mainly, though I don't promise to limit myself to reality. ]

3) Bush is NOT the real President. The quotation marks are more than appropriate, and even to refer to this guy as the president is a disservice to all others who have actually been elected. To accept on any level his precedent for gaining office is the most dangerous notion to come down the pike in a long time.

[ Let's review the salient points: Al Gore received more actual votes; the vote count in Florida was  —  and in the view of many fair-minded people, still is  —  highly questionable; and a conservative Supreme Court as much as overturned the will of the people to select the candidate of their favor. Yep, I will continue to refer to Bush as the "President". However, I am hopeful that, however else history may judge the election of 2000, the freakish and frightening circumstances that brought this administration to power are not a precedent. Frankly, that thought is about the only thing that keeps my head from exploding! ]

4) Whom one chooses to respect or not respect is a personal matter. Someone can’t tell me to respect someone just because he has a certain job. Hitler had a position of “respect.” A position NEVER deserves respect; only individual human beings earn that honor. A position is a strong indicator that someone MAY deserve respect but it’s automatic only if you’re a lemming. If I “respect” a cop it’s because he could cap my ass and get away with it. If I respect a person who happens to be a police officer it’s because he or she has been proven to be a good person.

[ My father spent many years in the military, and he tells the story of one of the first black officers in the Army touring a base in the South. One soldier refused to salute him as he walked past, so the officer removed his uniform coat, hung it on a post, and ordered the soldier to salute the empty uniform repeatedly. Then he donned the uniform and said "Soldier,  you may not like how I look out of uniform, but in this uniform, I am an officer of the U.S. Army and you will salute!". ]

[ I offer this (possibly apocryphal) tale only to show that this is a genuine struggle for me. On the one hand, I am a bit old-fashioned and I truly do have respect for the institutions of democracy in our grand nation. On the other hand, it's very clear that Bush gained the White House by getting just close enough and sneaking in the back door. ]

[ I respect the office, I deride the man, and I am horrified at the circumstances that put him there. ]

5) All evidence indicates that Bush is either evil or stupid — which one I don’t claim to know, although I suspect a combination.

[ I believe he is a man of only modest intelligence who is surrounded by exemplars of corporate indifference to the common good. ]

6) You need to be harder on Bush.

[ Okay! ]

BERT, WE HARDLY KNEW YE...

In response to this line in Semi Truths, Vol. 1, Issue 7 "Do the Hustle!"

"...Listen, Burt's all right I guess, but he's kind of ... you know ... dead.
What about Burt Reynolds? Or Bert Convey? 'Cause he was so cool in
"People Do the Craziest Things"!"

I received this distressing bit of news:

"I hate to be the one to tell you, but Bert Convey's dead, too."

I'm sorry... I just didn't know. I need some time...

Bert Convey 1933 - 1991 Actor, Humanitarian, Celebrity Spokesperson

WORLD WIDE WEB WORDS

As usual, definitions have been liberated from Dictionary.com. This week's words all have to do with, well, cattle.

SEMI SITES

The Official Mad Cow Disease Home Page
http://www.mad-cow.org/

In the better-late-then-never category, there is a website dedicated to coverage of Mir's demise at http://www.mirreentry.com

Ever been caught in an embarrassing situation where you've referenced a celebrity only to find out later that they're dead? Well, now, thanks to The Dead People Server, you can double check who's breathing and who's not. "The Dead People Server is simply a list of interesting celebrities who are long dead, newly dead or might plausibly be dead." Check it out at:
http://dpsinfo.com/dps.html

WRITERS ON WRITING

"Read over your compositions, and wherever you meet with a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out." --Samuel Johnson

All Contents (except the stuff I stole) Copyright © 2001 S.M. McCord.
Redistribution allowed, provided you cite http://www.semitrue.com.
If you happen to be in Charlottesville this weekend (March 21 -25, 2001),come see The Virginia Festival of the Book.