Is hypocrisy a crime?

There has been a lot of press recently about poor Senator Larry Craig and Representative Bob Allen, two Republicans who were recently arrested for tea-rooming^{[? - see alternative meanings]}, seeking to have sex in a public place. (Cool, the Wikipedia entry mentions Laud Humphrey's study-- I remember reading that twenty years ago-- in which he documented that half the participants in the practice were outwardly heterosexual, married men.)

The most damning charge against Craig is that he has engaged in a lifelong pursuit of hypocrisy. If hypocrisy is the worst the right can accuse Craig of having, it should read Dale Carpenter's essay, The Elephant in the Room, in which he writes: ( Peripheral to my argument, but relevant )

Another place in the essay Carpenter says this behavior is not hypocrisy, but is "better described as a form of ideological schizophrenia: private acceptance welded to public rejection."

I think that's exactly right. Even more to the point, like everyone else, I have an opinion about hypocrisy.

I'm for it.

Hypocrisy: "claim, pretense, or false representation of holding beliefs, feelings, or virtues that one does not actually possess." (Wiktionary)

The problem with calling Craig a hypocrite is that we really cannot prove, and should not strive to prove, that he is anything more than what he tells us: we should take him at face value. When he says he believes in "public morality" and his right-wing vision of the family and all that, we should believe him. It is our duty as human beings to believe him. Until this incident, we had no reason to believe otherwise, and given that the bulk of the evidence (a lifetime of right-wing adherence) tilts in a certain direction, we should continue to believe that he is what he says he is: a right-wing idealogue who does not believe in the acceptability of public policy that recognizes an inherent and equal respect toward gays and lesbians.

Senator Larry Craig violated his own moral code. This does not mean he is insincere in espousing it. Keeping to a strict code of conduct, however arbitrary, is hard; Craig happens to hew to one that is viciously at odds with his own nature and we should forgive him for his moments when his spirit is willing but flesh is weak.

Such a struggle between his base impulses and what he sincerely believes are the requirements of his own moral system is deeply human. For all of us, how we face this struggle-- and importantly, its consequences and outcomes-- is how we judge ourselves. For people like Craig, it also brings into question his Ultimate Judgement™.

I think he's crazy, but that's because he does not live within my context: his is informed by the scribblings of semi-literate goatherders and fisherment dead for at least the past two millennia, whereas mine comes from the Enlightenment. But I think I understand what went on in Larry Craig's mind, and I don't believe his hypocrisy deserves the heated outrage we've seen.

Dinah is home from the vet.

Poor kitty

We took Dinah to the vet for her teeth cleaning, and we've discovered why she was off her feed: her teeth were causing her terrible pain. So much so that she could barely eat. Her neediness was caused by her pain and hunger.

I feel bad because I could have done something so much sooner if I'd known to look for it. I mean, she was just at the vet three weeks ago, and she's been off her feed for months. It's one of the reasons why baby food worked for her: it could be eaten just by licking at it.

Also, one of the other things is that pouch-style foods are back on the shelves. Not Nutro Natural Choice, but Wellness Pet Foods is selling it, and in a variety of flavors. Now that her teeth have been cleaned and her favorite variety of food is available, she's eating two pouches a day, plus all the cat treats we give her. She even ate a chunk of a soft high-fat sausage meant for dogs. She's out to pack on the pounds as needed, apparently, which she needs; she's lost four pounds in the past six months.

With luck, hydration, and attention she'll do well for the next year or so.

My first panorama shot.

Park Butte Panorama

I'll write more about this tomorrow, but I couldn't wait to get this out and show it to you. This is my first panorama shot; it's from the High Heather Meadow southwest of Mt. Baker, which is about a half-mile up from the trail fork where Railroad Grade Trail and Park Butte Trail separate, three and a half miles from Schweiber's meadow and above Cathedral View Camp. There's a snowpack just below where the trail on which you can see the girls drops off. It took us four hours to walk up and get this shot.

I'm not sure why there's an exposure smear right where the girls are; a friend of mine suspects that my camera auto-adjusted for the snowglare coming off the mountain, and he's probably right.

This photo was taken with a hand-held Lumix TZ1 and stitched together using the open-source tools Hugin, Autopano, and Enblend.

A (much!) larger version (4555px x 768px, 945KB) can be found here.