50 Comments on “Various & Sundry, 12/13/09”

1. You can go ahead and donate my refund to the Peter Watts legal fund.

2. Dear Tiger Woods,

   You married a Swedish supermodel! How dumb can one human be?

3. It seems unlikely that Tiger Woods will see your message here, Christopher.

4. Mr. Scalzi – I do hope one day to come across you in a game of L4D2.

5. Lets hear if for the nice calming effects of kitty cats. Purr.

6. Better you should shoot zombies and pet your cat than do the reverse, I’m thinking.

7. Re: Tiger Woods.

   The real tragedy is that the same week as his act of arboreal vehicular homicide got saturation media coverage and analysis, another reasonably well-known black man was delivering a speech at West Point regard Afghanistan. You could be forgiven for not noticing that.

8. Irony is the Google ads on the Toronto Star link for:

   Become A Police Officer

   SWAT, K9, Narcotics, CSI & More.
   Online Degrees For Police Careers
   www . Public-Service . US/PoliceCareers

   Dr. Phil

9. I have tried to summon up a “give a shit” about Tiger Woods and am coming up empty.

   We’d be in a lot better shape as a country if we worried a lot more about abuse of authority and a lot less about who some “celebrity” is sleeping with.

10. “Scraped out”

    Awesome.

11. Happy suggestions for happy end-of-year lists:
    Top ten pictures of Ghlaghghee
    Top ten geeky moments of the decade (although I have no clue how to narrow them down)
    Ten BEST science fiction films of the decade
    Ten best internet fads of the decade
    Ten best internet shows of the decade (though I can only think of three shows that qualify here, most obviously The Guild)
    Ten strangest YouTube videos to get over 1 million hits

    There. None of those should make you angry. :D

12. That said, I do find it amusing that people are harrumphing that Woods really needs to “put a face” to the apologies he made, which I take to mean that he should trot himself off to Oprah and ESPN and do some ritually-approved self-flaggelation for our delight.

    I don’t get that, either. The only person he needs to apologize to is his wife and I’m presuming he’s already done that. Outside of that, none of our business.

    Let’s just hope the media find some new shiny thing to chase after and leave the man alone for a bit.

13. About the decade wrap pieces, whatever. And I mean that. Do it in January, when the decade is really over. Or define your own decade in 2011.

    You’ve spent most of the decade raising a child, which is the a scary, wonderful thing. Our kids are 15 and 18, so I can assure you that there is plenty of fright and fun in your future.

    For the last year, our family has had a good dose of both, with four suicides at my son’s high school and the students responding in the best imaginable way, deciding that everyone matters and they need to say that every day. I won’t repeat my blog post on Operation Beautiful, go here for some links: http://wunderwood.org/most_casual_observer/2009/10/operation_beautiful.html

    If you don’t care about my blog, check “Henry M. Gunn Gives Me Hope” (a palindrome!) with comments from students: http://hmggmh.wordpress.com/

14. For what it’s worth, I’d skip the look back and instead give us a wish list or something for the next ten years. Have fun with predictions or some such thing. It could be interesting and possibly less angry making. Whatever you do, I’ll look forward to the next however many years of reading Whatever you write.

15. I discover I’m just not in the mood for being ticked off about the entire last decade. I’d rather shoot zombies and pet my cat, you know?

    :)

16. “I’d rather shoot zombies and pet my cat.”

    I think I’m going to use this as a metric for every other decision I make, ever, as in,

    “Would I rather argue with this schmuck on the internet, or shoot zombies and pet my cat?”

    I expect my decisions are going to get infinitely wiser.

17. There’s a lot to be honked off about over the last decade. Hell, as a US citizen (even one living outside the country), I’ve spent half my life living under a clod. I’ve seen everything I was raised to believe in about the country that embodied spaceflight, great movies, crazy-high-technology and freedom get teabagged.

    Pof.

    Pof.

    Pof.

    How very shit that was, truly.

    Still. Never say day. Let’s worry more about making the next decade one to be proud of. This one is… what it is. Nothing to do but make the most of what we’ve got now.

18. Half my *adult* life, that is.

19. Question:

    Why does ESPN seem more upset about Tiger Woods’ infidelity than Elin Woods? Sure, Elin is angry, but watching Sportscenter this morning, you’d have thought Woods shot the president, sold nuclear secrets to Iran, and drowned Taylor Swift in Kanye West’s vomit.

    ESPN, you seriously need to STFU and concentrate on the truly important subjects, like how long new Nortre Dame coach Brian Kelly will be around before Bill Belichik retires/is fired and Kelly bolts South Bend to become the Pats’ head coach.

    Or why Hannah Storm was dressed like a psychedelic Catholic schoolgirl this morning.

20. Dear John,
    See, the problem is, I placed a large wager on your doing *five* of these posts by the end of the year! So I really do need a refund! The bet is for… um… oh… let’s say… ONE MILLION DOLLARS.
    I also accept refunds in chocolate.

21. Sheila wrote, in re Tiger Woods: “The only person he needs to apologize to is his wife and I’m presuming he’s already done that.”

    Y’know, that’s what some of us were saying about Bill Clinton, back in the day.

22. Wait, are we gonna impeach Tiger Woods now?

23. Not unless there are Cuban cigars involved.

24. Tiger Woods: May be filthy rich, but his cash flow is dropping like a rock as he’s on hiatus from the tour and sponsors are lining up to drop him from their ads. There’s a good chance there are morals clauses in those endorsement contracts that could force him to pay penalties to the sponsors. At best he won’t be getting paid for the remainder of cancelled contracts. Plus, he’s a prime candidate for a divorce. I predict bankruptcy within 5 years, unless he gets his marriage back together.

    Healthcare reform: Yes, we’re still in the sausage-making part of the legislative process, but the finicky little details that the lobbyists are carving out could make the difference between a financially viable plan and one that consumes way too much of our GDP in 10 years or so. If the healthcare plan goes bankrupt anytime soon, it could discredit the idea of government support for universal healthcare for another 2 or 3 generations. So maybe we should all pay more attention…

25. “I’m kind of scraped out on pissed-offedness at the moment.”

    Holy feces, can I empathize with that. Exhausting, is what the last decade’s been, as far as my ire is concerned.

26. Beyond this, at the end of the day, as I’ve noted before, the actual big win for the Democrats (and for Obama) is not whatever bill passes but the fundamental concept that every American under the law should have access to affordable and comprehensive health care. Everything else is squidgy bits and details which can be fiddled with and modified at later dates. The fundamental concept, that’s the thing I’m interested in seeing if they ultimately pull off.

    Well, if you were following the deliberation, you’d know that the whole fundamental concept has already been scrapped. This thanks in large part to the feature of Dems not staying in lockstep … nor even so much as strolling in the same general direction.

    The universal healthcare thingy has been kicked down the road. Because it’s evidently much more important to bail out wealthy insurance companies with mandates and simultaneously protect them from the evil socialistic threat of competition from any organization not fixated on the financial bottom line.

27. Bozo, some estimates put a divorce settlement around $300 million mark. Tiger is worth about a billion bucks. He’d have to be a complete bozo to lose $700 million in 5 years… um…

28. Hmmm… now that you mention it, thinking about my last personal decade… I started it trying to find a job, and now I’m back to trying to find a job. >.> This time around I’m not as desperate, though, what with getting unemployment money that I wasn’t eligible for as a new graduate.

    Health care: my thoughts exactly. This first bill is like a first draft. The details can be worked out after it’s passed.

29. Simon@21:

    Personally, I thought Bill Clinton’s adultery was a matter for him and Hillary — and if she didn’t have the sense to (as Dan Savage puts it) kick his lying douchebag ass to the kerb, more fool her but none of my business.

    It was the United States’ chief law enforcement officer committing perjury that got on my tits (and ironically enough deciding a law he aggressively lobbied for didn’t really apply to him), so I really fail to see how the analogy works. Unless shilling razor blades and over-priced sneakers is somehow equivalent to the Presidential oath of office.

30. Well though I would vote against it, if they do reduce the age of getting Medicare to age 55, I’ll retire in a heartbeat and let all you young folks support me in my “old” age. That is assuming there will be any doctors or hospitals that will accept Medicare after the change.

    I’ll also want to get in early because who knows how long it will last…

    Of course the good thing about that is that the work force will get rid of the majoirty of us “old timers” making room for all those degreed people who are flipping burgers or unemployed a chance to get a good job.

    The bad thing about it is they may not get the same deal when they retire.

    Of course, that won’t be my problem. So long as you pay for me to get health care, that is…

31. Bearpaw:

    “Well, if you were following the deliberation, you’d know that the whole fundamental concept has already been scrapped.”

    Just because I’m not talking about doesn’t mean I’m not following it, Bearpaw.

    Secondly, it’s still in process. The Senate has yet to vote, and when it passes whatever it passes, there’s the process where it and the House combine their two bills into a single bill.

    So your point is not actually correct at this juncture.

32. John @ 31:

    Neither the House nor the Senate proposals involve “the fundamental concept that every American under the law should have access to affordable and comprehensive health care”, so I’m not sure how we’d get it by combining two proposals that don’t have it — especially given that the trend of the entire process has been toward a weaker result. Granted, the final result is not yet cast in stone, but I don’t see the end result of this process including your “big win for Democrats” without the political equivalent of “then a miracle occurred”. Or, I suppose, a redefining of “affordable” and/or “comprehensive”.

    (Which won’t prevent them from claiming it is a big win, however much smaller it gets.)

    Frank @ 30:

    The proposed Medicare expansion — which is in serious doubt thanks to the opposition of Senator Palpatine Lieberman, et al — would involve people paying premiums if they want to enter the system early. If you can retire early and still afford the payments, go for it.

33. I’m probably in the minority here, but I always think phrases like “pet my cat” need the *not a euphemism qualifier.

34. Bearpaw

    which is in serious doubt thanks to the opposition of Senator Palpatine Lieberman

    Isn’t this the guy whose balls were locked up and in the President’s possession? If so, he must be acting on the President’s behalf.

    If you can retire early and still afford the payments, go for it.

    Two things: First, I’ll have to pay something one way or another.

    Second, since I’ll be “unemployed” won’t I get a tax credit?

    But who knows really. The closed doors behind which this thing is being hammered out is not the most transparent in history. Nor is it setting records for bi-partisanship.

    But you know, I believe there is a way to get to “something” for which the “squidgy bits and details can be fiddled with and modified at later dates”; forget the Left and go with what Blue Dogs and Republicans can agree upon.

    I’ve outlined such a proposal here, if you’re interested.

35. Actually, that link was my argument for cutting out the Left to get to a solution.

    Here is my outline for an agreement that could pass that involves Republicans and Blue Dogs.

36. Frank @ 34 & 35:

    Meh. “Cutting out the Left” isn’t exactly a brilliant new idea regarding Congressional actions. The Village practically requires it. They’re suspicious of anything that doesn’t involve punching a Dirty Fucking Hippie or two.

37. In my mind the only mistake Tiger made was getting married in the first place. Without that crucial first mis-step, he’d be getting nothing but high fives from most of the wind-bags who are howling.

    Also, he’d probably have a lot more time for Left 4 Dead 2.

    I’m not nessecarily saying marriage is always a bad idea (though more often than it isn’t, if you pushed me on it) but maybe he had a clue that he had *ahem* diverse tastes before he tied the knot.

38. ben @ 37:

    Marriage doesn’t necessarily put the kibosh on “*ahem* diverse tastes”, but if that’s a big priority, it’s a really really good idea to clear it with the spouse-to-be before committing.

    (For all I know — or care — maybe they did have such an agreement, but the suddenly public nature of the diverse tasting makes for a good public excuse for what’s-her-name to eject.)

39. Bozo the Clone @ 24

    Healthcare reform: Yes, we’re still in the sausage-making part of the legislative process, but the finicky little details that the lobbyists are carving out could make the difference between a financially viable plan and one that consumes way too much of our GDP in 10 years or so.

    It’s interesting, isn’t it, that the Congresscritters and pundits who put themselves out there as fiscal conservatives in this discussion tend to oppose many of the things that CBO analysis says would help lower the cost.

    A real public option, for instance.

40. You know, I’ve always had pretty low expectations of celebrities. I *do* think that if one is going to take the moral stand of “My private life and marriage are private,” one ought to keep one’s penis a private matter with one’s spouse.

    …Which is not to say that I think every 24 hour news network needs to be All Tiger All The Time, I’m just annoyed by the hypocrisy.

41. afurrica @ 40:

    You know, I’ve always had pretty low expectations of celebrities. I *do* think that if one is going to take the moral stand of “My private life and marriage are private,” one ought to keep one’s penis a private matter with one’s spouse.

    I’m not sure I follow you. Are you saying that only monogamous people should have an expectation of privacy?

    Because there are folks out there who have non-monogamy agreements with their spouses, and I don’t see how that should disqualify them from having privacy.

    Of course the more people one includes in one’s private life, the more difficult it becomes to keep it private. But that’s true even if one is just sharing secrets with best I’ll-never-tell-a-soul friends.

42. Dear Mr. Scalzi,

    This genial cheerfulness and goodwill towards men can *not* be allowed to continue. Summon some invective, lay into some poor schmuck who isn’t me[1], and tell us about the “Failtastic Naughties[2].” Don’t you know it’s Christmas?

    Respectfully,
    B. Peter

    [1] (flaps red cape tauntingly) ;P

    [2] “The Failtastic Naughties” would be a really bad name for a band.

43. Bearpaw,

    I’m not sure I follow you. Are you saying that the Tiger and Elin Woods have a polyamorous relationship?

    His public statements (which include the word ‘infidelity’) do imply otherwise, and it does appear that his wife was surprised to hear about the degree to which their marriage was ‘open’.

44. afurrica @ 43:

    I haven’t the faintest idea whatsoever of the nature of their relationship. Public statements and reactions in matters like this are of very limited value.

    I was pointing out that you seemed to be saying that only monogamous people should have an expectation of privacy:

    I *do* think that if one is going to take the moral stand of “My private life and marriage are private,” one ought to keep one’s penis a private matter with one’s spouse.

    Thank the gods I’m not famous, but if I where, and if my spouse was just fine with my privates being privately shared with others, I would still deserve a private life. (Though depending on the nature of the fame, I might be a bit foolish to expect my privacy to be respected, all things considered.)

    Now if the what’s-his-name in question was, say, a politico, pundit, and/or preacher whose influence was in large part do to their outspoken defense of “traditional values” and efforts to nose into other folks’ private lives … well, then I might have me a nice slice of schadenfreude pie a la mode. But this particular situation? Meh.

    The only golf I have any interest in is an occasional game of mini-golf with friends. The only reason I even recognize this guy’s name is in the context of him having some of his wins at places that would not have allowed him to play, not so long ago. (Which is no doubt related to some of what’s driving the media circus.)

45. Interesting…of the various topics listed in the original post, the one eliciting the most commentary in this thread is Tiger Woods. (Tiger Woods posts so far seem to be significantly outnumbering health care “scrum” posts). And of the comments on Woods, around half of them say something to the effect of “who cares?” Well, apparently you care, because you are commenting on it, instead of weighing in on the health care bill or something else.

    And while I am at it, I may as well chip in my two cents on the Tiger Woods mess…

    First off, if you are Tiger Woods, it is obvious that women are going to throw themselves at you wherever you go. You are going to spend a lot of time on the road, away from your family, and temptation will be there. So, you have a choice to make. You can either (1) make a VERY firm commitment not to give in to such temptation (clearly not the path Tiger took…and, frankly, not a path that most mortal men could reasonably be expected to take when placed in Tiger’s situation — there are exceptions, but such exceptions tend to be rare in the ranks of pro athletes and mega-celebrities with Tiger Woods level profile); or (2) you can be realistic with yourself and have some fun with various and assorted ladies when you are on the road. Tiger obviously chose the latter.

    Now, if you choose the latter, as Tiger did, you then have the option of either (1) NOT getting married at all; or (2) getting married with an understanding between you and your wife, before you walk down the aisle, that absolute monogamy is not part of the package she is getting in marrying you. Given that hundreds of millions of dollars IS part of that package, you will find that many, many women are fine with such an arrangement. When marrying a guy like Tiger, any number of women would find it acceptable that, for example, when Tiger crosses state lines, all bets are off from a fidelity standpoint. Expect that he is cheating on you (because you know he is), and have your fun spending his money and sleeping with your tennis instructor. As long as there is an understanding in place, there is no harm done. But the key is to have that understanding in place ahead of time. She knows what is going on, and she’s okay with it. Hell, she is doing it too. When you’re in town, you’re the happy couple, smiling for the cameras and enjoying champagne in the hot tub together. When you’re out of town, you’re doing your thing, and she is doing hers. Like it or not, this is how many high profile celebrity “marriages” work. And they work out just fine, people have their fun, nobody gets hurt, and nobody’s career gets ruined.

    What you absolutely CANNOT do if you are Tiger Woods is PRETEND like you chose Option A (i.e. real, traditional marriage involving a commitment to monogamy), while in fact living Option B (i.e. taking advantage of your wealth and status by partying it up on the road with various and assorted women), and trying to hide all of this not only from your wife, but from the mass media. Because you WILL get caught, and the consequences WILL be devastating, not only for you personally, but for your family, your public image, and the career that you worked your entire life to build.

    Stupid move, Tiger. You could have had it all. All you had to do was be honest with yourself and your wife, and you could have had your cake and eaten it too. Too bad.

46. LB @ 45

    Given that hundreds of millions of dollars IS part of that package, you will find that many, many women are fine with such an arrangement.

    Some women (and men) are just fine with such an arrangement even without hundreds of millions of dollars involved. Or even fifty dollars.

    Expect that he is cheating on you (because you know he is), and have your fun spending his money and sleeping with your tennis instructor.

    It doesn’t really make sense to call it “cheating” to do something that your relationship agreement allows for.

    What you absolutely CANNOT do if you are Tiger Woods is PRETEND like you chose Option A (i.e. real, traditional marriage involving a commitment to monogamy) …

    I haven’t the faintest idea whether they ever presented themselves as having a “real, traditional marriage involving a commitment to monogamy” or not. But I think it’s worth noting that plenty of very real marriages don’t happen to include a commitment to monogamy, whether or not people around them assume that they do. (Or assume that they should.)

    Hell, even if they specifically and publicly said that they were being monogamous, I wouldn’t be inclined to get too bent out of shape if they had some other kind of mutual private agreement. Would that be dishonest? Sure. But it’s dishonesty in the context of celebrity culture. Hell, celebrity culture is essentially popular fiction that happens to be anchored on flesh-and-blood people. That’s hugely less of an issue to me than this same sort of dishonesty in politics, particularly involving people who are always in everyone’s face about “family values” and “defending marriage” and manipulative crap like that.

    Just to emphasize what should be obvious, I haven’t the faintest idea what their real arrangement really is/was. (And probably neither does anyone else here.) I also don’t really give a crap, because I’m extraordinarily unlikely to end up in the sack with either of them. I’m just popping assumption bubbles.

47. Frank at 35: Your proposal on health care would seem to be a very good starting point for discussion. On the other hand, it would never pass as:

    1) It doesn’t put more money in the hands of insurance companies;
    2) Fails to create a sufficiently large federal bureacracy that congress people could then staff, in highly paid leadership positions, with their wives, children, siblings, girlfriends and campaign donors.

    So no gold star for you.

48. BP@46 —

    Fair enough with regard to several of those points, although I would point out the following:

    (1) It’s pretty safe to assume that Tiger and Mrs. Tiger didn’t have an arrangement allowing for Tiger to have sex with other women — if Tiger and his wife did have a prior arrangement of that sort, then what the hell is this all about? The only other remotely rational explanation would be that this is all some sort of elaborate show being put on by Tiger’s soon-to-be ex-wife to justify the divorce that she wanted anyway, and to drive up the settlement figures. But that strikes me as far fetched.

    (2) While I am not one to pass judgment on the relationships of others, I think it is fair to say that marriage traditionally presumes monogamy. That is not to say that it ALWAYS or SHOULD presume monogamy, but to say that monogamy is the standard expectation, and anything else would certainly deviate from the norm. If one is married and the issue of monogamy is not specifically addressed one way or the other, I think it’s a fair assumption that your spouse expects you not to have sex with other people. It is, at a minimum, the default. That said, I agree with you that if non-monogamy is agreed upon ahead of time then it does not constitute “cheating” — that was just a poor choice of words on my part.

    (3) Just to be clear — my point is not a moral condemnation of Tiger. His conduct was immoral insofar it was deceptive, but that’s really not my point. (Incidentally, I am certainly not shedding any tears for the soon to be former Mrs. Tiger, who will undoubtedly be extracting quite the nest egg from this fiasco such that she, her kids, and her future grandkids will never have to lift a finger again in their lives if they don’t want to). My point is that, assuming what appears to be the case is (i.e. he had a wife who believed she was in a monogamous relationship, and recently discovered that her belief was extremely unfounded), Tiger is now paying an enormous penalty for a combination of stupidity and arrogance — stupidity in making promises in the context of his marriage that he apparently lacked either the intent or the ability (or both) to keep, and arrogance in actually believing that he, as an extremely high profile public figure, would actually be able to keep his rampant philandering a secret from EVERYONE into perpetuity.

49. LB @ 48:

    (1) Your “far-fetched” explanation is too common to be far-fetched. People put on shows like that pretty often, even with far less money and public attention involved.

    (2) I absolutely agree that absent any other agreement in a committed relationship, it’s reasonable for the participants to assume monogamy, given societal assumptions. On the other hand, it is not reasonable — though perfectly understandable — for anyone outside the relationship to make that assumption. At least not to the extent of being outraged when and if the assumption turns out to be incorrect.

    (3) “My point is that, assuming what appears to be the case …”. My point is that the fact that you (and many many other folks) are making assumptions makes any strong reactions based on said assumptions really overblown.

50. Bearpaw, it’s pretty obvious that Tiger’s wife DID think they were in a monogamous relationship. If she hadn’t, she wouldn’t have attacked him with a golf club. And the idea that she attacked him “for show” so that she’d get more money in the divorce settlement makes no sense. Committing domestic abuse will get a person LESS money, not more. And a possible jail sentence.

    So I don’t think the Woods’ marriage’s monogamy is an out-of-left-field assumption like you’re trying to make it out to be. In fact, it’s not an assumption at all. It’s self-evident.