Robert Lee Moone broke into a home in 1989, armed with a knife, and attempted to sexually assault a 13-year-old girl. He was sentenced to 45 years in prison because we can’t have people breaking into homes and sexually assaulting 13-year-old girls. In 2010 he was granted parole. Moone is so dangerous, though, that “[a]fter he was granted parole, he was placed on a “Super Intensive Supervised Program” with 24-hour monitoring.”

No worries, then. A Super Intensive Supervised Program must be not only intensive and supervised, but super intensive and supervised. Tuck your babies in bed and leave the windows unlocked. He’s monitored, like, 24 hours a day. Super intensively.

What’s that? Moone walked out of a Texas halfway house and cut off his electronic monitor on April 10th? Well, that kind of thing hardly ever happens. Not in Texas, anyway.

It was the second escape of a high-risk sex offender in Texas within a week.

Michael Elbert Young, 42, climbed over a barbed wire fence at the Southeast Texas Transitional Center in Houston on Thursday night after removing his electronic monitor.

Young served eight years in jail for aggravated assault and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, the Houston Chronicle reported. Both charges carried a sexual element, and Young also served time for the sexual assault of a child and attempted aggravated sexual assault convictions.

The Super Intensive Supervised Program and electronic monitoring don’t seem to be working. It might be time for a Superduper Intensive Supervised Program. Unless that’s going too far.

Conditions in Florida are dry and hot. General conflagration has not broken out but that is not from any lack of ignition. There has been a sudden squall but whether it delivers more rain than lightning remains to be seen. George Zimmerman is in custody, surrendering without incident with the public release of the charges against him.

This should be a moment of great relief, should it not? The Martin family has consistently said that what they want is Justice for Trayvon, as the copyrighted phrase has it. Further they have said that what they desire is an arrest and a REAL investigation inverting the usual order. The implication is that there has not been a real investigation until now, the one delivering charges of second degree murder on a set of facts that the original Sanford based prosecutors thought warranted no charges at all. It is easy to understand why observers might think that so but mostly because of faulty information or explicit DISinformation, all of which will now be hashed out in open court, as it should be, while much of it has been hashed and re-hashed in the public sphere. Here is another helping of hash, including leftovers that have since gone sour.

The initial cause of outrage has become moot as it has proven to be false. The Martin family advocates originally stated three untruths: first that Zimmerman never was taken into custody on that fatal night. That falsehood stood nearly unrebutted until the release of a security video showing Zimmerman in handcuffs at the cop shop. Team Martin also declared that the crime scene was never attended to in any meaningful way but we have since seen video of the usual technicians and procedures being performed promptly and as competently as we can tell. The third falsehood was that Zimmerman’s pistol was never taken in as evidence. This also we know to be a flat inversion of the facts. 

So the original story has proven to be a fraud, in its compilation describing a scene truly outrageous even if all Zimmerman had said were true and complete. Indeed this was the position of the earliest Trayvonists, a principled stand on legal procedures, a bandwagon I joined early and dismounted early as well. The image of friendly cops inquiring almost not at all about the shooting of a young man, under whatever circumstances, was revolting and I revolted as much as anyone (twting and fbing it March 20th) but when the key elements proved to be fabrications I was outraged afresh at the fabricators. Few seem to have followed. Instead any criticism, objection or simple scrutiny of the facts or the players is proof of racism. Even the observation of peripheral facts like the clearly illegal laying of a bounty on Zimmerman’s head is racist. Any notice that the President’s gratuitous racial solidarity with the Martins is improper is racist. Anything but a blind eye turned to Trayvon Martin’s public adherence to modern thug culture is racist. Surprise at this designation of Zimmerman as a “white Hispanic” is racist. Needless to say, all these racist expressions make you complicit, if not a gleeful participant in the infanticide that Zimmerman’s actions represent.

This while the antagonism for Zimmerman, like the support for Obama, is openly and frankly racist. It is the Administration at large that wants the two conflated. The US Attorney General who now sits over a “civil rights” investigation of the Martin shooting embraces in maudlin approbation the disgraceful pig, Al Sharpton, a filthy criminal who launched his wretched career with a hoaxed rape of a black girl by a spectrum of prominent white men in New York law enforcement and government prescribed by Sharpton. While that fraud collapsed, Sharpton suffered not at all, evading a civil judgement by further fraud. Continuing on, Sharpton turned a protest over a traffic accident into a howling anti-semetic mob that burned a store to the ground killing seven people. Those incidents barely begin to tell the tale of this lunatic who stands at the height of the black power structure now in the ascendent. Holder attends a convention of Al’s National Action Network, delivers a completely uncritical and full-throated endorsement of those National Actions which lately have included perpetuating those three formative lies of the Trayvon movement and all the others that have come after.

Is Holder some marginal figure? He seems poorly known in his home district. Domestically he is second only to the President himself in power and yet has even greater responsibility in the area of law enforcement. Quaint notions of fairness or neutrality are not ignored or discarded, they are actively destroyed on the national stage for reasons of racial solidarity. That is the only reason for Holder’s blatant contempt for electoral laws of all stripes. His actions against the simple requirement for real identification at polling places demonstrates that well enough but the very election of Obama gave the real truth of this man’s poisoned mind. The scurrillous and contemptible racist fascists, the so-called New Black Panther Party (having only cosmetic distinction from the murderous gang that gives us sitting Houseman, Bobby Rush) were taped driving off voters from a Pennsylvania polling place with threats and brandished weapons. Holder quashed the legal case against them that was already successful showing that he serves not just a race-based administration of the law but a fealty to the lowest, worst and most dangerous elements of society. There is no question and at this point can be no debate. Obama and Holder openly promote, seek and practice a government OF the black people, BY the black people and FOR the black people, not simply in government largesse but in the application of ALL laws; civil, criminal and regulatory. The fact that the Panthers and the Team Obama leg-breakers that brought similar tactics to the Texas Caucuses and elsewhere mostly practiced their violence on fellow blacks and Democrats is not mitigating but should be enlightening except that such enlightenment is also quite thoroughly racist.

Now the witch’s brew of racial animosity fomented by figures in government and without threatens to over-boil. No one turns down the heat. No one. Has the President or the AG denounced in the mildest terms the bounty that STILL publicly hangs over Zimmerman’s head even as he surrenders himself promptly to the authorities? Absolutely not. Has there been a single word from ANY black leader condemning the open calls for Zimmerman’s murder or the lurid threats of murder against whitey wherever he is found? Absolutely not. Have even the celebrities like Spike Lee who giddily publicized the address of ANOTHER Zimmerman and called for a lynching party to visit suffered ANY opprobrium? Absolutely not. Has a single black leader called for calm and restraint even as criminal charges, the supposed goal of the movement, been laid? Absolutely not. Nor will you.

There is no surcease on any front because no one in this parade of disgrace ever gave a fuck about Trayvon Martin or ever will, and that includes Trayvon Martin, a nihilist punk, self-named on twitter, SLIMM@NO_LIMIT_NIGGA. What limits did he feel himself above? You can guess or you can click but you will not be surprised. He drew his name from a profane rant glorifying criminality and violence. Looking away from this reality that figures like Bill Cosby and Steve Harvey occasionally struggle against is a large reason why Trayvon and numberless boys like him enjoy a cloaking field with their own parents and people that absolves them of responsibility even to pull their pants up. The idea that these lost boys might have to be saved from themselves and the monied exploiters of their ignorance before they are saved from Nightriders is too large and terrible to contemplate, therefore it remains uncontemplated.

So we enter a darkened wold on a path we have been on as long as any of us can remember. OJ was the trial of LAST century. Zimmerman’s will be the first trial of this one but not the last, most likely this is the opening blow in a long, long campaign in what has been a long struggle already. Look for no easing of tensions for those in charge are not in the easing business. Already the arrest of Zimmerman has proven anti-climactic and unsatisfying. Second degree murder? That is an insult, a recognition that Trayvon was a second-class citizen; this is what the ignorant who called for something named “justice” already are saying. If Zimmerman is granted bail though he has demonstrated he is no flight risk, this will also be a racist affront. Any change in venue will be a racist attempt to subvert the locals’ just outrage. Jury selection that weeds out those who sport a Pussy Ass Cracker t-shirt will be the subject of outrage at the justice system at large. The defense attorneys will be harassed, at least. The judge will need lifelong bodyguards around the clock regardless of the outcome and if there is a conviction, the absence of the death penalty will bring the name Troy Davis back to every throat. Already there is a national campaign, quite open, to murder Zimmerman once he sets foot in a jail and we know who owns the jails when the lights are out but even his head on a skewer will assuage not a single heart because outside and inside the prison walls the grotesque conveyor belt of murder will continue as the real driving motor is NOT white racist hit squads running amok (and if it were, Jorge would be unwise to sit with them). It is young black men who are killing young black men and if you were conspiring to see that disaster accelerate you could hardly do better than to cripple both law enforcement and legitimate self-defense as the Trayvon imbroglio is doing at an alarming pace. The astonishingly numerous voices celebrating their own liberation at the sight of Zimmerman in handcuffs will not sing for long as the gunfire in the ‘hood is undiminished; perhaps increased.

And what if the worst occurs? Even a cursory understanding of the law implies that this second prosecutor, Corey, has overcharged. The facts as we know them would have to diverge wildly from the facts as Corey can prove them to support murder 2 and if she does pull it out an appeal on dozens of grounds is assured; fair trial being foremost. What will happen if after all this Zimmerman walks free? Well, remember what happened when OJ was acquitted?

Not that.

As it is said, politics is showbiz for ugly people. The Judiciary, then, is largely a political field for those who don’t like shaking hands. This is no indictment against those on the Supreme Court or a lesser bench somewhere. It is a fact recognized at the Constitution’s writing and ratification. Without checking, I recall in the Federalist Papers on the matter of the Supreme Court, the clear problem of Justices being beholden to the President who nominated them and/or the Senators who confirmed them was to be addressed with lifetime appointment. The theory (which I think was from Madison) was that while a Judge may indeed be in debt to those who put him behind the bar it would be a debt never paid as the Judge is more protective of his own legacy as a fair-minded arbiter, however fictitious that may be, than he is eager to keep political accounts squared since he is now in his final office. As with the rest of the Constitution there is little reliance on having virtuous, capable figures at the highest positions in government, rather there are institutionalized incentives to persuade whatever rat-bastard winds up in there to do the right thing. So while the Court is allegedly above politics we know jurists to be subject to the same disabilities as Presidents and Legislators. They have power. It corrupts. Let’s forgive the President’s recent statements then for they are not as unprecedented as the appalled detractors would have it. FDR spoke against the high court in strident terms. He ran against them, something Obama clearly intends to repeat if he loses. Thank the gentleman for this unambiguous invitation to apply a bit of Crackology in the marbled chambers.

There is no need to strike any illegal blows, rather just to put aside the traditional rhetorical and procedural deference of the co-equal branches to each other. Impeachment. It’s not just for Presidents anymore. Actually it never was. Impeachment is something of a Legislative criminal indictment. In America its only punishment can be removal from public office so it is applied to the odd President. More often, though still not often enough, to judges. It is indisputable that Obama’s statements, especially denouncing the Justices as an unelected body, were meant to communicate to them that their legitimacy would come under political assault from the Executive if they did not return a palatable decision. Fair enough, sir. You have staked your position. The answer must be immediate and unequivocal: impeach Kagan. Impeach Elena Kagan today. She is in blatant and clear violation of judicial ethics, not as understood by today’s Bar but as they have been understood since antiquity. How can any judge preside over a matter one day that she advocated the day before? Kagan was Solicitor General for Obama up until she was proposed as a Justice, some seven weeks after Obamacare’s passage. Can anyone dispute that she has at least the appearance of a conflict of interest? Before you snort that off as superficial, understand that appearance is expressly all that is needed to require her to disqualify herself. But you see another conflict of interest. She is to disqualify herself, an act she seems unable to commit. In the alternate, the parties may move to have her recused but of course only one party would want that, the State Attorneys General, basically the plaintiffs, and it is a notoriously tricky business. Even the presumptive antagonists to Obamacare, the Republican appointees, might take it amiss to have one of their own’s ethics questioned. That is why the House should take it out of their hands and off their minds, introducing Articles of Impeachment for Kagan’s failure to disqualify herself for the appearance of a conflict and pursue evidence of an ACTUAL conflict, subpoenaing all communications from the Solicitor General’s Office on the matter of healthcare and all communications of any sort to or from Kagan with an eye to demonstrate that she was intentionally misleading during her confirmation.

While that may happen in the House, though with Boner in charge it will be tough, the Democrats own the Senate. They will never go through with a trial and conviction that results in removal. Exactly this was said about Bill Clinton, and of course it was true. But that is supposed to be immaterial. It’s not but it is supposed to be, just as judges are supposed to withdraw. Really it is the DUTY of any House member who believes Kagan should be recused to impeach her for her clear violations. In a world where it is universally known that Kagan was nominated solely to be a certain upholding vote for Obamacare why has this not already happened? We know. Kagan enjoys the protective field of an Affirmative Action hire. As a woman, any opposition to her will be a sexist assault, especially as the day’s War on Women continues. Only cowardice prevents her impeachment in the House but cowards may still commit brave acts when fired upon. The House is under constant withering fire from the Executive. Now with his open political attacks on the Supreme Court they should feel the urge and opportunity to fire back. Impeach Kagan immediately. It is not a close question.

Nor should there be any hesitation or question that Ginsberg should also be impeached without delay. Yes, she also is an Affirmative Action hire though she was more put in place for her pedestrian socialist views than anything else. The Housemen dare not let her skirts protect her. Hey, they ALL wear robes anyhow and that is one of the reasons. Justice for jurists is supposed to be as blind as the justice they dispense. Any figure who has gone to a foreign country for the express purposes of denouncing and delegitimizing our Constitution is wholly unfit for any government office except maybe public defender, though the vapidity of her views makes her competency suspect even there.  She took an oath to defend the Constitution. Admitting that she did so under false pretenses seems to easily breach the “Good Behavior” on which her continued tenure expressly lies. Again this is not a close question. Failing to impeach Ginsberg is a dereliction.

Waiting for the House Republicans to evolve into vertebrates may be impractical but the Judicial can and DID strike back, quite appropriately, on its own. In the Fifth Circuit there was another Obamacare related suit in progress. The three judge panel (Republican appointees, since you ask) have demanded the DOJ attorneys before them explain whether or not the Executive, as a matter of policy, endorses the legitimacy of the federal courts. Given the President’s statement, this again was an action compelled by the law and simple sense. If the senior partner in a law firm or a CEO of a company appearing before the court had denounced its legitimacy and independence they would be subject to contempt. Adverse default judgments could well be entered on the grounds that the suits or their defense were not in good faith. Pfft. Gone. And take this disbarment with you. Instead the court had the Attorney General explain himself. Every DOJ attorney with an active case before a federal court should have been required to do the same. But Crackology rules WITHIN coalitions of all sorts. Jeffrey Toobin, Obamacare’s free-range mouthpiece, had to publicly get his mind right after righteously declaring the oral arguments “a trainwreck”. He denounces this rather mild and absolutely required bit of pushback as an outbreak of lunacy, his timely and intemperate slander clearly compensating for his previous candor which could only be a symptom of shock. But the homework assignment was turned in, on time if lacking in substance. While eliding it as much as possible, the response could not do other than contradict the clear statements of the President, cracking the connections between Obama, Holder, the law and the courts.

Each of these actions or, more accurately, reactions, effectively plump the court’s view of itself as a legitimate and co-equal branch of government against Obama’s threat against same. The anonymous advocate for lifetime judgeships thought this would be the very thing, other than decency and intellect, that would protect the court from the usurpation of its role now attempted by the Administration. Before we throw up our hands or take up our arms we should see if the old schemers are proven right yet again. Impeach Kagan or just make the public attempt. If she holds her credibility dear she will at least recuse herself as she should have done in the first place. Could it be that her illegal leak of the proceedings to the President is already a regret for her? If not, it must be made so and this also would be a fine foundation for impeachment by itself. Ginsberg’s treachery will at the least be widely exposed. How many folks on the street know what she has done and said? Even without the real prospect of removal a more even-handed approach should be the result and if it is not, at least she will be exposed. The composition of the Fifth Circuit panel aside, is it not possible that even Democratic appointees felt a chill from the President’s lips? They too, after all, are unelected and as the dedicated “Progressives” we know them to be, they are also aware that huge swaths of their accomplishments and even more of their projects rely on explicit judicial activism of the sort Obama has just mendaciously and hypocritically rubbished. They also have their dignity, judicial and otherwise. Since they can’t be fired could they push back in their own way? It would be unwise for the firm of Obama and Holder to inflame the judiciary at large against them, thinking otherwise.

So the crude round of hew-and-patch comes openly to the law courts. It is Obama who has brought Crackology there. So be it. Nasty outbreaks of derision inform us the time is ripe. As always we will divide and unite opportunistically. We will blast and drill as we soothe and smooth, deducting from Team Obama while adding to our own coalition, at the top as much as at the roots. While the President affronted all judges, I consider Sotomayor with especial interest. Demonstrating herself to be ignorant of the law and reason on the other side during Orals, she may be dim enough not to know why she was put on the Court in the first place; just like Kagan, as a gimme for Democrat-friendly decisions. And if she does realize that could she revolt for the sake of her now precious credibility? It depends on how seriously she takes her oath, her self and her job. She sits in an office designed to encourage independent thinking even in those unused to it, the one thing Utopia cannot survive.

Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster were both about 19 years old when they created the character called “Superman,” in 1933. He was based upon the title character from a novel called Gladiator, by Philip Wylie, Hercules, and Samson. Also, interestingly enough, Siegel and Shuster seem to have swiped the name “Superman” from an ad for “The Man of Bronze,” Doc Savage:

(Image source)

He was not originally appreciated by editors:

But the two did still try to sell Superman and got back nasty replies from some editors. Bell Syndicate told them, “We are in the market only for strips likely to have the most extra-ordinary appeal, and we do not feel Superman gets into this category.” United Features said that Superman was “a rather immature piece of work.”

Finally, in 1938, the pair of impractical dreamers managed to sell the character and an initial 13 page story to Detective Comics, which is now known as just DC. The total value of their first check was $412 and, as it turns out, that supercheck is now up for auction by a company called ComicConnect, which features a suitably purple description:

On March 1, 1938, DC Comics gave two young men from Cleveland $130 for the rights to a comic character named Superman. That $130 check essentially created a billion dollar industry and set in motion nearly 70 years of legal battles that continue to this day. Without this check being written out by DC Comics, there would be no Superman, and thereby no Batman, Wonder Woman, Spider-Man, X-Men, and all the characters that came into existence after the concept of “the superhero” was born with Superman.

Much has been made of the original 1938 $130 payment to Jerome Siegel and Joe Shuster. Did DC Comics take advantage of two eager young men looking for their big break in the comic business, or was this an unequivocally fair business practice between comic book writers and publishers in 1938 America? Whatever you believe, the $130 check is the quintessential symbol of the debate.

No, Superman was not the first superhero to appear in comics. He wasn’t even the first superhero that Siegel and Shuster published. He was the first one to hit, and he hit really, really big. But who’s to say that there wouldn’t have been another, equally as big, perhaps even bigger? Who’s to say that some other genre character might have caught on, and superheroes been an afterthought? Maybe one of the other characters with stories in that first issue of “Action Comics” would have been even more popular, if Superman hadn’t gotten in his way — perhaps the Mandrake the Magician knock-off Zatara would have opened the floodgates to a slew of comic book magicians, and today we’d all be suffering through an era of big-budget Supermagician films? Robert Downey Jr as… Starkoni the Surprising!

Obviously, that is all Earth-2 speculation that doesn’t get anywhere. The point is, on this particular of the infinite earths, Superman was created and Superman opened the floodgates. And his creators received $130 for the character. Here are some images of the check, taken from the ComicConnect auction site:

Please note the ominous notation on the left side of the check:

THIS CHECK IS IN FULL PAYMENT OF THE FOLLOWING ACCOUNT AND THE PAYEE ACCEPTS IT AS SUCH.
NO OTHER RECEIPT REQUIRED.

Today’s contract language is much more thorough, covering all media that now exist or will exist in the future, in perpetuity, but the message behind those words is clear enough.

By signing this check, you acknowledge that we own Superman.

But, there have been complications, as the AP inadvertently notes in their coverage of the auction:

Made out to the duo for $412, the check includes a line item for $130 showing that DC paid for full ownership and rights to the man from Krypton and paved the way for comic books, TV, radio and films. But, a legal dispute over creator’s rights to the character is still far from settled.

Did you catch the error in the paragraph above? If you’re a comic book fan with a sense of history, or if you’ve been following the convolutions of the Superman Copyfight Crisis, you probably did.

The error is this: In that first story, Superman was not from Krypton. In the first panel of Superman’s first story, from the first issue of Action Comics, we learn,

“As a distant planet was destroyed by old age, a scientist placed his infant son within a hastily devised space-ship, launching it toward earth!”

The planet didn’t get the name “Krypton” until the next year, in the first panel of the first issue of “Superman”:

“Just before the doomed planet, Krypton, exploded to fragments, a scientist placed his infant son within an experimental rocket-ship, launching it toward earth!”

See– they were rebooting characters even in the 1930s.

Anyway, if you’ve been following the legal shenanigans swirling around Superman, you know that concepts like the exact date on which the concept of Krypton was created take on fabulous significance. Also, when did his alter ego, Clark Kent, start working for the Daily Planet rather than the Daily Star? When did he move from Cleveland to Metropolis? When did we discover his father on Krypton was called Jor-El? These questions are partly why the heirs of Jerry Siegel were able to recapture only some elements of the character back in 2009:

This means the Siegels — repped by Marc Toberoff of Toberoff & Associates — now control depictions of Superman’s origins from the planet Krypton, his parents Jor-El and Lora, Superman as the infant Kal-El, the launching of the infant Superman into space by his parents as Krypton explodes and his landing on Earth in a fiery crash.
…
In 2008, the same court order ruled on summary judgment that the Siegels had successfully recaptured (as of 1999) Siegel’s copyright in Action Comics No. 1, giving them rights to the Superman character, including his costume, his alter-ego as reporter Clark Kent, the feisty reporter Lois Lane, their jobs at the Daily Planet newspaper working for a gruff editor, and the love triangle among Clark/Superman and Lois.

While ownership of the Man of Steel is one point of all this legal activity, the real issue is money and how much Warner Bros. and DC owe the Siegels from profits they collected from Superman since 1999, when the heirs’ recapture of Siegel’s copyright became effective.

DC owns other elements like Superman’s ability to fly, the term kryptonite, the Lex Luthor and Jimmy Olsen characters, Superman’s powers and expanded origins.

That original check was not for “the rights to the man from Krypton.” The Superman that Detective Comics bought in 1938 was not the same Superman that we all know today. That Superman couldn’t fly, for example — he could “leap 1/8th of a mile.” That’s why DC still owns Superman’s ability to fly. It was the Fleischer Brothers studios who first had Superman fly — apparently it looks silly to have an animated man in blue acrobat tights and a red cape “leaping” around all the time.

The whole legal fight is even more complicated and nonsensical than DC’s post-Crisis continuity. In fact, the legal issues are so convoluted that back when DC was fighting with the Siegels over the rights to Superboy they created a distasteful allegory called “Infinite Crisis.” As they were losing that case, they turned Superboy into a villain, canceled his book, and separated him from the rest of the DC Universe. (Lately, apparently, DC has come to some kind of agreement with the Siegels, because Superboy is back, and he’s a clone!)

Now, things are getting more complicated:

In a strategic move in the copyright battle between Warner Bros and the heirs to Superman’s creators, the studio has filed an appeal to reverse earlier rulings in the case and put everything out in open court in a trial.
…
“This case is about the ownership of copyright in the earliest comics that introduced elements of the iconic Superman character and story,” the appeal from Warners lawyer Daniel Petrocelli states. “The case presents an unusually broad array of doctrinal, factual, and procedural issues. But much of the case reduces to a familiar proposition: a deal is a deal.”

Warners contends that Laura Siegel Larson, the heir to the Siegel estate, “reneged” on a copyright deal with DC that “guaranteed the family many millions of dollars in cash, royalties, and other compensation.” In its call to have the issue decided by trial, the studio says “the family asserted there was no deal without a long form and the district court agreed, casting aside established California contract law principles — principles essential to the entertainment industry, where many business deals are never formalized.”

So, a deal is a deal, but in the entertainment industry, many business deals are never formalized. Do you understand that? Because I don’t. I admit I have had only very limited experience with this, but I think that in the entertainment industry those “business deals” that aren’t “formalized” consist of you and your buddies sitting at Cantor’s talking about how cool it would be to make a movie with Robert Downey Jr as a Supermagician called Starkoni the Surprising, and he battles this woman who’s sort of a cross between Hugh Hefner and the Wicked Witch of the West, who’s trying to take over the world with her coven of centerfold models.

So, yes, Warner Bros, a deal is a deal, and that’s fair and all. And Mr. Siegel and Mr. Shuster (whose names were misspelled on that check, by the way — that’s why they each had to endorse it twice) signed that NO OTHER RECEIPT REQUIRED check, but. In that case, a deal being a deal and all, can you please explain why it is that you and your corporate entertainment cohort continue to clamor for changes to copyright law? A deal is a deal and all, unless of course we can get the government to come in and change the terms for us. And all the while, DC and Warner Bros — who actually just started publishing a new comic book about the Frankenstein monster, created by Mary Shelley, who had the bad form to create her intellectual property long before it could be protected — have been let’s just call it zealously protecting their “intellectual property.”

But, back to Siegel and Shuster.  Mr. Siegel wrote the scripts, and Mr. Shuster did the artwork, for awhile at least. The character became so popular, and was appearing in so many pages per month, including appearing in a daily newspaper strip, that Mr. Shuster employed a stable of artists to help him keep up with demand. Also, sadly, Mr. Shuster’s eyesight began to deteriorate, making it all the more difficult for him to draw.

By 1942, Superman’s creators were in their late 20s, and making more money than they’d ever made before, chronicling Superman’s adventures. Meanwhile, Detective was licensing the hell out of their character. He appeared in a radio show, a series of animated shorts, puzzles, trading cards, dolls, and an official fan club.

Siegel and Shuster would sue National (formerly Detective) Comics in 1946, in an attempt to get back the rights they’d signed away with NO OTHER RECEIPT REQUIRED back in 1938. They’d settle for $94,000.

For how long had they been thinking about suing their publisher? At what point did Superman’s creators start to feel resentment over the fact that while they were doing work for hire on their own character, the publisher was making… well, who knows how much on those Superman trading cards and puzzles?

Siegel himself might have given us an answer, with the help of Shuster’s art studio, in the 14th issue of Superman’s self-titled book. There is an astonishing story in that issue about an unscrupulous businessman who cheats an inventor out of the fruits of his labor, only to be manhandled by Superman. The opening panel gives an overview of the story:

Siegel and Shuster, the “impractical dreamers,” signed that check four years before this story was published, and the fruits of their labors were annexed by Detective/National Comics. So they used their character to get revenge on those unscrupulous schemers, just as they’d used him to get revenge on slumlords, war profiteers, gangsters, and coal mine owners.

Siegel and Shuster’s MarySue is an inventor called Chet Farnsworth, who has created “a powder which would almost instantly extinguish flames.” Clark “Superman” Kent intends to introduce Mr. Farnsworth to an honest businessman who might help him, but the impetuous Farnsworth has already signed with an “unscrupulous schemer” called Jim Baldwin.

Darkly, Clark Kent hopes — for his sake — that he gives Farnsworth a square deal.

But he doesn’t.

These might be the most amazing five panels ever to appear in a mainstream superhero comic book. The creator of the most popular superhero figure in the world is openly protesting the treatment that he and his partner are receiving at the hands of people who own his creation. And he got them to publish this pulp cri de coeur for him.

But, as bleak as things get in this story, Siegel and Shuster’s Superman sets everything right:

Things didn’t work out quite as well for Siegel and Shuster.

Jerry Siegel and his family were broke, their economic status had gotten so bad that Siegels wife Joanne, visited Jack Liebowitz at DC and told them how bad things were. She asked him “Do you really want to see in the newspaper-Creator of Superman Starves to Death?” Jack Liebowitz did not, so DC gave Siegel some writing assignments in 1958. At a price, Jerry would receive no credit or special privileges for his work. But sometime in 1964 Jerry made a comment about wanting to be treated better, and he was immediately fired for it.

In the late 60′s and early 70′s Siegel and Shuster were once again the focus of public attention through comic conventions. They would then go back into court in 1975 for another attempt to sue DC for the rights to Superman. The court decided that the two were not owed any money, but DC did decide to pay the two a “pension” of sorts. They received $35,000 a year for the rest of their lives. Jerry and Joe also got credit for their Superman creation. They got this with the help of then DC Publisher/Editor in Chief Carmine Infantino and many other big name creative people, who persuaded DC to give the creators something. While DC didn’t have to pay anything, it is still a small sum considering the 10′s or possibly 100′s millions that DC made off of Superman in movie, cartoons, comics, and merchandise deals. DC also made Superman related money from copyright infringement lawsuits against other companies, the most famous of these was their out of court settlement with Fawcett Comics.

As we’ve already seen, the legal battles that Mr. Siegel and Mr. Shuster began in the mid-1940s have continued all the way up to today.  Superman has remained an iconic character, despite DC’s continued efforts to neuter him. He’s worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and he’s subject to one of the most mind-bendingly convoluted stories ever conceived.

The never-ending Copyfight Crisis!

The panels from Superman issue 14 were scanned from The Superman Chronicles Volume 8, a book that is very much worth your time if you’re at all interested in comic book history in general, Superman in particular.

There has been a spark in Florida. Whether it proves igniting depends on the condition and volume of the available fuel. It has been hot and dry across the nation for some time so we should be cautious with cigarette butts and any other sort of burning. In that case, maybe Al Sharpton should have stayed home. Too late for that now. He has broken out the tropical suits and the high-humidity hair treaments. Rev Sharpton has been one of the leading voices championing Justice for Tayvon as this movement is aptly known, calling for patience and support for the Martin family as they brace for the possibly imminent arrest of their son. 

The details of that evening are combustibly in dispute but some of the evidence is in the public domain. 911 calls record the last words of George Zimmerman, age 28, the community watch captain in this modest gated community. The one thing that is certain is that the Sanford police explicitly told Zimmerman NOT to approach the “suspicious” character who turned out to be seventeen year old Trayvon Martin. But he did, according to Martin, accosting him from the rear, gun drawn and trying to restrain Martin. He resisted this ununiformed, armed stranger and struggled with the gun resulting, accidentally he says, in a single shot being fired that killed Zimmerman instantly. Martin was taken into custody without incident, questioned in the presence of his father and counsel and released.

There are witnesses to this twilight exertion but in some regards they conflict. One question is, who was sitting on whose chest? If, as Martin contends, the larger Zimmerman was straddling him about to rain his fists down on his face, Martin would have a good claim of self defense, although he contends the shooting was accidental. But the sounds of dismay on the 911 call were plausibly coming from either participant. Martin claims it is him. The witnesses who only heard and did not see are split as to whether it is Martin or Zimmerman. The one who claims to have seen the conflict at dusk but at a distance, says it was Martin over Zimmerman at close quarters.

The coroner’s report and forensic investigation are not in. From the cop shows we know that the technicians will be able to draw many of the finest details from their art. If the bullet was fired from above, it is in the ground and will be unearthed if it hasn’t already been. If it was fired from below they will be able to tell that to a certainty. A grand jury is impaneled and will decide on an indictment of Tayvon Martin, the most probable charge would be one of manslaughter.

But waiting for indictments is not everyone’s cup of tea. The Florida latino community is up in arms. They complain that this clear crime, the open murder of a young husband defending his neighborhood from what everyone agrees is a crime wave, is being brushed under the rug. Racial overtones are unmistakable. The black community argues for cool heads and patience with the system. Sharpton offers counsel and support as Trayvon’s legal team is assembled from pro bono bigfoots and a sharp array of media defenders.

In the mean time Zimmerman’s family remains in seclusion. The patriarch of this family with Peruvian roots and cousins of all colors has released a statement defending his late son from media charges that he was overzealous in his position with the neighborhood watch, that he may have assaulted Martin for racist reasons. Neighbors mostly agree as he has aided more than a few with crime problems in this thoroughly integrated development. Unfairly adverse and conspicuously perverse media treatment has been brought down on a dead man, possibly killed in the legitimate execution of a public trust though neither paid nor trained to do so, George’s survivors say.

Justice For Trayvon moves forward. It is a sensation across the social media sites. #Justicefortrayvon trends on twitter. Meaning? Meaning a lot of people are publicly talking about it, for good or ill. There is real approbation for it though as the movement is collecting large sums of cash from small, dispersed and diverse donors. The newly formed JusticeForTrayvon Trust has seven figure deposits and takes more every day. Martin will have the finest in representation, that seems certain. In addition to straight material support, Martin also enjoys energetic demonstrations at the local courthouse, though he is not there, and in cities around the country.

While Colonel Sharpton moves things forward on the front in Florida, General Jesse Jackson is defending the supply lines. Jackson is on a flying tour speaking before La Raza groups and making other public addresses regarding the concerns of the national hispanic population that Zimmerman’s death is being subsumed under a cloud of black racial solidarity. Jackson made it a point repeatedly to explain that hispanics, blacks and indeed all “persons of color” owed it to their posterity to stick together, making a solid and growing majority as long as hispanics and blacks stay in step. But when questioned about what this might mean specifically Jackson asserted “…blacks are under attack in this country.” and the attempt to short circuit due process for Martin was an example of it.

Gun control groups and their antagonists have also made hay. Florida’s “Stand Your Ground” law is under public assault with Martin as a hook though the facts of the case aren’t really germane. Those who abhor guns completely raise a horrified cry that Zimmerman actually carried his legal and licensed firearm. Look, look! they say. Your gun will not save you. It is more likely to shoot you. The gunners say, quite rightly, the guns are already out there. We will not disarm.

The most shameful response, though it may still prove the most prudent, has been from the so-called white community. It is unchronicled anywhere but if you are white, you know what it was. It was a great big PHEW!! and a pantomimed wipe of sweat from our brows as the unlikely named Zimmerman was revealed in his stock photo to be of hispanic origins. We will officiate and spectate at this one and quite happy we are to be off either end of the hook. But no, honky-crackers. ’tis not to be. Yes, as a practical matter, in the media and that miasmic stink we call a culture, this will be a racial melodrama like Westside Story without the romance, but you are still involved. There is the potential for a fissure in the Rainbow Coalition to open like the Cracks of Doom, exposing the lava beneath and swallowing those in the front rows. This could well be a good thing. If caused by agitation and animosity, it will prove to be a very bad thing indeed. Are Americans of any color doing their duty by voting Present? No. If the bigs of race and government are determined to hash these things out on the front lawn, so be it. AG Holder called us cowards to our whiny little faces years ago. And he was right. It’s time for courage then, even if it is rum courage, to say the simple things we all know.

Justice for Trayvon and justice for George are one and the same thing. These are not opposed ends and should not enjoy opposed camps. Justice will involve a full, public and contested airing of all the facts modern inquiry can produce. Does that mean a trial and only a trial? No. It may well be that the facts will not support a charge even of manslaughter. Should the district attorney of Sanford make such a charge without evidence, the city would be in for a nasty Sharpton-fueld lawsuit and probably will be anyhow. If the evidence on the spot that evening were thoroughly cut and dry does anyone truly doubt the police would have made their charge? Why? Believe it or not, all the infuriating and contradictory elements of our system of justice are there for a reason. If the shoe were on the other foot, would the Zimmerman camp want the benefit of the doubt and an open system of trials; Due Process, as we call it, apply to him? I suspect so. All the self-clicked photos of black Americans in “hoodies” that are papering the virtual earth imply, I hope, an objection to being railroaded rather than tacit support for violence, however justified.

Yes, I am certain this is the case in America’s big heart. I say extend to Tayvon at least half of the patience and forbearance recently, if improvidently, shown for Casey Anthony but lay on the same scrutiny. From that case Florida should know that justice is often denied through no lack of effort or competence by the authorities. Still, we live with it. We swallow it. We participate in it as honestly as we can because the alternative of frustration and revenge is far worse. We can be thankful that there has been at least ONE figure acting with propriety. When asked to comment on the Florida controversy at an unrelated Rose Garden press conference this morning, the President declined.

Proposition 8 was a heartbreaker for those who loved Candidate Obama the second best. His greatest admirers were those like Samuel Jackson who saw in him an ethnic reflection of themselves. His “message” didn’t mean shit to them. But a close second in devotion is that other bulwark of Democratic politics, the gay community. Though they tended towards Hillary (a known fan of sensible shoes), like many other key groups they saw in Obama a champion of their cause. They were as disappointed as the young hemp enthusiasts but much sooner. They knew on Election Day that Prop 8 had passed adding an Amendment to the California Constitution defining marriage as a union of one man and one woman.

The dissappointment was to some extent their own fault. Candidate Obama had never publicly supported literal gay marriage any more than President Bush had. Rather, like those who took cannibis for medical reasons and hoped to be able to take it legally in any setting, the gay marriage advocates assumed that a President Obama would indeed be actively on their side though his stock response to questions always was, “My position is the same as the President’s (Bush), civil unions.) No one believed it. I don’t believe it. What are the odds that Obama TRULY does not favor absolute equality of gay marriage? As an issue it is uniformly supported by his demographic; elite university graduates/government bigwigs. But an alliance of gays and their  more numerous allies is far from a majority; not even in a Democratic primary. It might be different if the balance of the electorate were, like me, flagrantly apathetic to marriage, gay or sullen. That is not the case. Mr. Hillary knew it although he clearly was hostile to all marriage. He made his accommodations with his own base on gay issues, recognizing two powerful blocks were and are opposed to “gay rights” as we know them. That would be the Catholics and the blacks.

We’ll throw the Latino vote in with the Catholics, no objections there, right? It is a statistical, electoral fact (as far as such can be determined): it was the appearance of Barack Hussein Obama on the national ballot that made Proposition 8 a near certainty. How? Why? The Golden State, birthplace of referenda, had been a battle-ground on this issue for years. Before Prop 8 there had been an ordinary statute of identical construction. It was struck down by the State courts. So the defenders of traditional marriage, as they style themselves, set about immediately to put an Amendment in place. The marriage enthusiasts were also energetic. They married and married and married boosting the sales of wedding kit and fattening the wallets of many a photographer. In part this is pent-up demand, yes? Those who could not swing the airfares to Hawaii or Mitt’s Massachusetts could now enjoy a court ordered matrimonial regime like those happy jurisdictions. But this was also a move in the great chess tournament; a castling maneuver that would protect their newly uncovered rights with the weight of the Grandfather Clause. If all this was going on without your knowledge, you are in good company. As can happen even with a political obsessive, this controversy came to the attention of much of the electorate only at the polls on election day. Collectively the opposing forces spent about $80 million in advertising and for once the divide was almost even. It is the gunslingers’ permanent frustration that lavish spending STILL does not reach many ears and long-term polling STILL does not capture many voices so the gay marriage lobby had a brutal shock to go along with their relief at seeing the tailpipes of John McCain. Prop 8 won handily, even in a solidly Blue state, even with a pumped up Dem turnout. And the culprit was Barack Obama.

Chalk this up to the eternal perversions of politics. Obama’s presence on the ballot naturally SPIKED black turnout and this is after a spike in black registration fanned by his candidacy. Hillary would certainly have won California and probably with as great a margin. The pro-8 hispanic vote would have been largely the same. The anti-8 gay vote would have been largely the same. And Democrats collectively would oppose Prop 8 but the newly engorged black vote most certainly did not. Whether religious or secular, even the Californian black community is not up for this particular struggle. It adamantly prefers its gay constituents on the Down Low. Those calculating electoral chits certainly knew that on both sides. The PR men however, and this includes the candidates, had good reason to disbelieve and keep to themselves the private cautions of the gunslingers: as the Obama vote increases so does the support for Prop 8. You know the reasons. To even admit to such a breech in your coalition is to encourage the breech to widen. The fissure between the Democrats and the devout is one of the most active known to Crackology while even the gay vote is far from a monolith. Elections sweep away the stucco and show the state of the brick underneath.

The courts have always been more availing than The People so off to the courts we go. The 9th Cir Ct of Appeals strikes down the Amendment as the State courts struck down the law. And on even more expansive grounds. Whatever your views you may find that you are not familiar with the arguments even of your own side. No need to break a sweat catching up. I relieve all the combatants of their duties with the simple observation that the decision of the 9th, should it be upheld, has rendered ALL marriage Unconstitutional.

Deviation from a position shared by Barack Obama and George Bush is difficult to categorize as Left or Right so let us assert that it is ABOVE the prejudices of both these gentlemen. My position, which has now been ratified at the Federal level is not Marriage for All, but Marriage for None. Both Obama and Bush favor civil unions or domestic partnerships for gays that exclude “marriage” only rhetorically. Some of the State civil unions laws actually state the intent to deliver ALL the rights and privileges of marriage, except the name. The 9th correctly decides that this can only be explained by an animus for a particular group of citizens. Unlike the gay lobby, I will not define either religious scruple or Common Law objections as mere bigotry but our tattered Constitution clearly states Equal Protection under the Law as sacrosanct. Yes, the Constitution was ratified while truly horrific punishments were prescribed for homosexuality in some precincts. That is of no consequence. Precedent, legislation and simple social requirements have rendered those moot, even in hellish Texas! All citizens are to be held in common before the law. That means not civil unions for gays but, as far as the government is concerned, civil unions for ALL!

So what will this mean, if marriage is struck down, as the gay lobby puts it, like segregated schools? The Grandfather Clause, wrinkled gift of the Common Law, is again in play. Your marriage, as well as a sacred bann, is already a civil union; a contract recorded at your county clerk’s office. Yes, your divorce, annulment, adoption, military separation, deeds, trusts, wills and diverse other social agreements are there as well and like your marriage contract are unaffected by mere changes in their names. In Louisiana they pollute our legal system with FRENCH, yet their records are as sound as any other (in just theory). No, this does not admit polygamy necessarily. Keeping the partnerships to one-on-one is a perfectly sound restriction that can be applied to all evenly. And let us quickly put aside the bilious absurdity that we now admit inter-species marriage. No, however comely your goat, Abdul, you cannot make an honest doe of her (or billy of him). This contract is a contract. If you can’t buy a used car from livestock neither can you marry it. This also means that no one otherwise incompetent to contract can enter into marriage. The legal age for marriage has just become 18 or whatever the Age of Majority is by statute. Perhaps this is something for the traditionalists but there is something else larger and far more important. Believers, if you don’t believe me, believe your eyes your ears and the Constitution; government and religion just don’t mix. The religion sinks right to the bottom. If you, as you should, want the government out of your medicine and your charity you must be willing to get your religion out of government. So what does this mean? It means that marriage will still exist but will only be recognized as a civil contract equal to others in the public, legal realm. That is only part of our existence for the moment and the de-recognition of marriage is part of the defense of the perilously shrinking private sphere. You may still be married by a priest and it will still be a sacrament with your congregation, like Confession or a bar mitzvah. Does the county record your First Communion? Okay, maybe in Louisiana, but what is it’s legal weight? None or nearly none. Does that diminish its relevance to you or to Eternity? If so I think you have missed a day or two of Catechism.

In any event, keeping marriage “holy” doesn’t seem to have increased its staying power. Even those precincts that don’t recognize divorce have a divorce rate at least equal to the nation at large. What does that tell you? Is all marriage sacred? What of marriage concluded by fraud? Wracked with adultery or violence? Or plagued with reciprocal apathy? If that is Holy Matrimony, give me Unholy Divorce! Most marriages are initiated by the man; most divorces by the woman and never have I encountered an unjust divorce. Marriages that profane the name through their condition are endemic. So save the snark at the irony of the First Gay Spouses of California making use of the surviving law of Gay Divorce. If marriage is not in the heart and of free will, something only the participants can decide, then it is better we do not enforce it with the alacrity of the Fugitive Slave Act. Once the separation of the sacred from the earthly was a large part of religious faith and practice. Now we have an opportunity to Render unto Ceasar what is Ceasar’s and reserve to ourselves the sacred and eternal while admitting our own fallibility and embracing our neighbors without malignity. This we can do while renewing our vows to the most basic tenet of our beloved and beleaguered Constitution. Shall we do that? Yes.

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Society forgives a lot. Don King killed two people — yes, he really did kill one person, then decide this wasn’t enough so he later killed another — before he pulled his life together and entered that most honorable of professions: boxing promotion. (And in fairness, in the first case he was trying to protect one of his illegal gambling houses and in the second the guy owed him money.) Likewise, Mike Tyson served time for rape, but now most people tend to ignore that in favor of the nobler moments from his life, like when he sang along to “In the Air Tonight” in The Hangover or beat the hell out of Don King. Perhaps the only crime you can’t redeem yourself from over time is child abuse. And this may be why there doesn’t seem to be a measured response to it: it is an offense that seems either to get ignored completely or for which everyone connected in any way must be destroyed immediately, disregarding the possibility that they might actually be innocent.

Penn State has pursued both of these methods. It’s well-known that upon the initial accusations against former Penn State defensive coordinator Jerry Sandusky, virtually nothing was done. It’s also now been revealed that Penn State’s Board of Trustees, upon learning about the criminal investigation of Sandusky, sprang into action and…elected to continue the policy of doing nothing, as it had worked so very well up to that point. Indeed, it was only when the media storm hit with Sandusky’s arrest that they did something, firing Joe Paterno immediately. Then, just to show they meant business, they denied JoePa’s 80-something wife access to a Penn State pool. (Really.) Finally, they issued a memorandum to Penn State security guards reading: “Should you come upon Joe Paterno’s dog, kick it in the face. Go, Nittany Lions!”

I made up the last one. But whatever his moral failings, Joe Paterno has not been convicted of a crime. And he will apparently not be convicted of a crime, because he has not been charged with a crime, which is the first step in a conviction. And, for that matter, Jerry Sandusky hasn’t been convicted of a crime himself yet by an actual court, no matter how shifty he seems on camera. (And he does seem amazingly shifty: if a man could be tried purely on body language, Jerry would have started a life sentence weeks ago. Not to mention he gave his autobiography the there-is-surely-no-horrific-double-meaning-hidden-in-this title Touched: The Jerry Sandusky Story — this is a man itching for prison time.)

I’m pretty confident something criminal happened, but I was certain those Duke lacrosse players were guilty of rape. (In case you have a short memory, they were not.) Prosecutors makes mistakes: sometimes honestly, sometimes as a result of deciding a conviction’s a conviction, even if you’re prosecuting someone innocent. (And remember, when you prosecute the innocent, you violate everything America stands for and, as a fun bonus, enable the guilty to get away with it.) Former New Orleans D.A. Harry Connick Sr. is a particular expert at this (read about one case here, in which his office willfully hid a blood sample proving a man’s innocence even as he sat on death row) — next time you listen to Harry Jr. crooning, ask yourself if the song sounds the same knowing his old man is Don King, only minus the hair and the high moral standards.

And in an age when the internet makes it possible for anyone to be part of the media but there’s less and less money for actual reporting so “news coverage” means “Here’s some crap I saw on a blog that I cut and pasted onto my blog”, it’s important to remember that justice can move too fast as well as too slow.

It is possible that we will discover more damning things about Joe Paterno during the trial of Jerry Sandusky. It is possible this scandal will not just taint his legacy, but overshadow it completely. But Joe Paterno, Jerry Sandusky, the Syracuse assistant basketball coach similarly accused of sexual abuse (who, since being fired, has already had one accuser admit he lied about the whole thing), those Duke lacrosse players, and every other person, be they innocent or guilty, deserves due process. Before dispensing justice, Penn State’s Board of Trustees had a brief meeting behind closed doors, one they neglected to inform Paterno about until they phoned to tell him he was fired.

The firing may turn out to be justified — indeed, it very likely will — but based on the fact they knew and didn’t care about Sandusky until the press showed up, it’s hard to think anything other than these were panicky little people trying to overcompensate for their own failings. (I wonder if anyone in the secret meeting said, “Hey gang, we’re firing Paterno for knowing and not doing enough…when we knew and didn’t do anything. Shouldn’t we resign or something?” I bet that guy got a beating.)

Having buried Paterno, Penn State proceeded to pee on his grave. After a drawn-out search, Penn State announced the hiring of a new head coach: Bill O’Brien. It is, to put it mildly, an interesting choice. O’Brien has no head coaching experience. His main qualification is that he’s the offensive coordinator for the New England Patriots. Indeed, he is the third New England offensive coordinator to be snatched up for a head coaching job since 2004. The first two were Charlie Weis and Josh McDaniels.

Despite Weis going into the college ranks with Notre Dame and McDaniels staying in the pros with the Denver Broncos, they turned out to have a similar coaching style, one that might best be described as arrogant off the field, incompetent on it. They burned enough bridges they might have lost their jobs even if they’d managed to win games. Fortunately, they did not: Weis led Notre Dame through the worst stretch in Fightin’ Irish history with a 16-21 record over his final three seasons (all the while bragging about how he’d blow some minds once he installed his “pro-style offense”) and McDaniels went 11-19 before he got the axe midway thru year two after it was revealed he had concealed that his team had been violating league rules by illegally taping opponents’ practices…all the while the New England Patriots continued to score at will, suggesting coaching is easier when you have Tom Brady throwing the ball and Bill Belichick looking over your shoulder.

Understandably, Penn State looked at this rich tradition of Patriot assistants and said, “Wait, there’s a third one of these guys? We’re booking a seat on this gravy train!”

Of course, O’Brien does have one big thing working in his factor: he has no connection to Penn State. (And, by extension, no link to Joe Paterno, since he’d been the head coach there since 1966.) Over the decades there have been hundreds and hundreds of players (and dozens and dozens of assistants) in no way connected with any of the abuse allegations who came to Penn State, won games, and graduated. (This may sound a small achievement, but any fan of college sports can tell you, the athlete who plays at an elite level and still consistently finds time for class is a rare beast.) Many of these alumni are outraged that Penn State now considers them at best irrelevant and at worst toxic when no one, not even Jerry Sandusky (who, it’s worth noting, stopped being an official part of the program in 1999), has yet been convicted.

I don’t blame them.

I should note I have decidedly mixed feelings about Joe Paterno. I think there’s much to admire about the man (how many coaches would use their own money to build their school a library?). On the other hand, he’s buds with Republican presidential candidate (and former U.S. Senator from Pennsylvania) Rick Santorum, which for me is only a few steps above pulling a Rumsfeld and shaking hands with Saddam Hussein. Santorum is a devout Catholic and views his faith as a license to be cruelly judgmental of others, notably homosexuals; Paterno is also Catholic and presumably agrees with this, based on how supportive he’s been of the Santorum clan. (Religious disclosure: I also come from Catholic stock. And yes, I feel about this much the same way I feel about Joe Paterno.) Of course, the irony is that while attacking the wickedness of others, acts of true evil were occurring closer to home, with child abuse rampant within their beloved Catholic Church and, it appears, in the Penn State family as well.

(Side note: During John Paul II’s time as pope, child abuse in the Church was ubiquitous all over the globe. When confronted with these offenses, the Church tended to look the other way or, on a number of occasions, actively protected the priests, sometimes transferring them to other parishes where they could safely continue to molest children. For presiding over all this, John Paul II is — you guessed it — going to be rushed to sainthood in record-shattering time, with Pope Benedict making a point of waiving the five-year waiting period normally required after a candidate’s death. And suddenly being an Episcopalian seems less ridiculous…)

That said, the fact remains that in 1996, a security guard named Richard Jewell was named as the top suspect during the Olympic Park bombing at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, as the FBI speculated that he placed the bomb himself so he could play hero. The media jumped on the lead and discovered it made perfect sense: after all, this guy was fat. And didn’t he live with his mom or something? Airtight case! Except it turned out he was not only innocent, but by spotting the suspicious package he had indeed saved dozens and dozens of lives. (Incidentally, Richard Jewell died at 44 of natural causes — sure the three months of constant public humiliation had no impact on this at all.)

And for a long time many people believed Ted Bundy to be innocent because no one so charming and handsome could be a serial killer.

The point is, the justice system works best when it moves steadily. The next time a scandal like this breaks, let’s hope the victims’ accusations are acted upon immediately, but also — no matter how heinous the crime — that everyone takes enough time that someone’s not only punished, but that we get the right person.

In conclusion, I suspect Joe Paterno got what he ultimately will deserve. But he got it much too soon and I think there are a lot of other people — looking at you, Penn State Board of Trustees — who warrant a much harsher fate.

Final musing: By his own account, Mike McQueary discovered Jerry Sandusky in the shower with an underage boy and was convinced there had been sexual contact between them. McQueary was already 27 at the time; he stands 6’4” and weighs over 200 pounds. Sandusky was approaching 60 and considerably smaller than that. McQueary responded to this situation by leaving both Sandusky and the boy, then telling Paterno about it THE NEXT DAY.

This still makes no sense to me.

Maybe we shouldn’t have the end of the year during the holidays. Yes, it is one of the holidays itself but maybe they are too concentrated here on the long tail of the annum. Legislative and other periods link to the end of the calendar year causing deadlines to loom just when offices are empty or emptying. Once phones rang unanswered from Thanksgiving Wednesday to January 2nd. Now they roll over to voice. Which is more cruel? There are a few folks still on the job although they eye the clock nervously and jostle their keys. They are trying to “get things done” and whatever that means it apparently means the same thing two days before Christmas as it means on any other day at the Capitol and the White House.

The tangle is deep and tight. If you know your players and their CVs, the sides seem oddly inverted. President Obama and his Democrats propose an extension of a cut in taxes that is scheduled to expire, or “sunset” come the New Year. This is to benefit the “middle class” through tax relief. The mindless, toothless Republicans running riot in the House are opposed. Only their opposition comes in the form of a yet longer extension of said tax cut. Say what? This is no simple INversion, more like a PERversion of sense and consistency that is opaque to anyone spending less effort to understand it than a crossword might require, which is nearly everyone. This inky maelstrom has been decades in the making.

To begin, the tax is no tax. Except when it is. The Federal Insurance Contribution Act’s deduction from your paycheck is not a tax. It is a compulsory insurance premium, sound familiar? By law these funds are NOT supposed to fund general government operations but whatever is not paid in bennies and overhead is to be kept in a trust; that famous Lock Box. But what is that? It turns out the Lock Box is just another ledger entry invested in secure, long-term instruments of impeccable provenance; Federal Treasury Bills which, do what? Fund general government operations. And these are not ordinary T-bills but special non-convertible bonds that can’t be bought or sold, only redeemed. On their schedule. So there is a largish dollop of The Full Faith and Credit of the United States of America on deposit but you aren’t going to be cashing it in. Whatever Social Security’s convoluted liabilities finally amount to is  tomorrow’s mystery. In the here and now the money taken out of your check under FICA is not a tax when Republicans complain that large portions of the nation pay no taxes (they mean income taxes). It is a tax when Democrats want to give “refundable tax credits”; direct cash payments not otherwise plausible. In this both parties have been on both sides. Ephemera like this is much of what occupies the time of your Legislators and it is relevant only to demonstrate how thin and threadbare the whole controversy is. But if it isn’t a tax, it is certainly a levy, the eccentricities of which we have discussed before.

Let’s go ahead and call it a tax cut. How did our players get on the wrong sides of the stage for this one? While it was incorrect and impolite to say that the $80 per month this would add to the average take-home is trivial to the taxpayer it is trivial as a tax event. This sort of tax cut or a concomitant tax hike that is transitory, tiny or otherwise co-opted was practiced first by Mike Huckabee (later Mitt Romney) to generate a functional answer when he was accused of being profligate as a Governor. “Well, I cut taxes seventeen thousand times!” The “times” are immaterial, it is the total relief that matters economically and mathematically but whatever. The precedent is well set and the media refs have already called this an Obama ball so let them take it. If Boner’s benchwarmers want to get back on the board they need a couple new plays.

It may be infuriatingly mysterious how Boner’s proposal for a 12 month extension of the FICA cut rather than 2 months STILL marks the Right out as the pillager of paychecks but the rejoinder suggests iteself; if 2% is good, why isn’t 4% better? Or 8%? Heck, we can make it a 100% tax cut while only raising it to 12.4%! Certainly there is some leverage available. This would be consistent with that old, sadly improper, stereotype about Republicans never having met a tax cut they didn’t like. Indeed that is the trap Boner has fallen into. The fulcrum that has allowed it to be turned into a figure-four neck break is that reliable Third Rail of politics, Social Security.

Reagan first made his famous rejoinder regarding Medicare but the point applies to all modern entitlements. Mr. Carter denounced Reagan for wanting to de-fund and defenestrate that particular program…. “There you go again,” was the response. Rather, Reagan would “fix” Medicare and also Social Security by making them “solvent”, how? Increased taxes, of course! Although we know they are NOT taxes; and it gets more complicated from there. The once New Dealer, Reagan, indeed seemed to have no animus towards Social Security or Medicare, certainly none based on small-government idealism or Constitutional principles. For him and all his heirs these programs actually WERE what they are not so cunningly disguised as, namely insurance. So their off-book accounting was proper and continues to this day. Social Security and Medicare related liabilities are not considered part of the national debt now over $15t and many other commitments of the government to future payments are likewise obscured in folds of deception.

This was the great aim and result of Social Security; to lay a tax disguised as something else in order to fund a government expansion in all realms and all directions. It is an invisible tax hiding in plain sight. It is chicanery and diversion of this sort that the Republicans should make it their vocation to unearth and denounce but if even Reagan would not do so (not from PR concerns but from affinity for the policies) then who will? No one we’ve seen except perhaps Ron Paul and even he stops short of exorcism as a solution. It might be easier for folks who get elected for a living to speak the simple truth that our entitlements are unjust and unConstitutional when it is more obvious that they are unworkable and unbearable. Any reduction in Social Security funding hastens this day, I am therefore in favor of the payroll tax cut extension. I am for its expansion. But everyone who traffics in greenbacks should fear, even if they do not oppose, its expiration.

Another inversion of our stereotypical positions is this pernicious “sunset clause” tripping us again. Back when the payroll tax cut was passed as part of the stimulus legislation the opposition (though meager) was from the Democrats and from the Left. This was a threat to the Social Security system, clearly. The only way it was palatable was if, like with the insane and devastating income tax cuts of the hellish Bush, the cut was temporary. VERY temporary, as in some point after the recession is clearly over. December 31st ’11 seemed about right. Now all gaze on the New Year with horror absent the extension. Why? Because without ammendment, current law would require every employer in the nation to withhold 6.2% for FICA rather than the 4.2% they have been doing, also they are on the hook for their own half of the Social Security “premium” but we always figure the draw on BOTH as dunning the employee, because it does. So what we are really looking for January 1st (which has now been moved to March 1st) is an immediate tax hike. If you pay only payroll taxes on net (as half of taxpayers do) this will amount to an instant increase in your tax burden of 50%. You are going from an 8.2% rate to 12.2%. Horror, indeed.

But this is a tiny horror compared to the Mother of All Sunsets, which will see the end of the Bush tax rates. Recall, these were to expire at the end of 2010. This would have meant, likewise, a near 50% tax hike for many payers and a 100% increase, if you want to look at it that way, for those many low earners who paid NO income taxes under the Bush rates but some 15% or so under the pre-Bush terms. In any case EVERYONE’S income taxes would go up substantially, materially and irrevocably since the sunset clause is part of current law requiring Congressional approval and a Presidential signature for any alteration. That is now a crisis scheduled for December 31st 2012.

Does that sound familiar? It is to that date that all the bigs claim they want the payroll tax sunset removed. Yes, even for Reid and Obama, the two-month timetable was only a stopgap. They also claim to want the full year but this kind of reverse-flip play is commendable when exercised by Democrats, so we commend them That doesn’t change the fact that now we are scheduled for a double-sunset; come this time next year we will be facing de jur tax increases of a truly mind-boggling size and suddenness; for the hundredaire as much as the millionaire. But surely by that time this recession will be over. Growth will be around 8%. Unemployment with a five-handle and we’ll still have 3% bonds. So, come on 2012!

If only we can get through a couple months. This is in question because, although media types guffawed at Boner’s complaint that the two-month extension is not even practically doable, that was not the Speaker’s contention. Rather he was repeating public statements from experts in the payroll industry. But what do they know? They say that five-odd working days, at the height of the vacation season, is not enough time to re-write and then test the software to keep the withholding from being withheld. A year would have been possible since they could continue on with today’s practice. The haples Eric Cantor’s counter-offer of a 3 month extension was also more pragmatic for the check-writers, since a quarter is at least a timeframe comprehendable to business actions. But no. The President has got what he asked for. And whatever the result we are all going to be back again in 64 days. Happy, merry. Joyous, prosperous.

As we withstand the informational deluge from Penn State, we are faced with the possibility of another case of institutional child abuse, in which a whole group of people, a whole structure, contributed to the horrific abuse of children. It is clear that we are just not getting it.

We need a new lens to view the sexual abuse of children. We collectively profess to know it’s wrong to rape a child. But not only is child abuse common, people in powerful positions protect abusers. Maybe some day we’ll crack the psychiatric pathology of the pervert/pedophile, but understanding those who would protect them? They must only be able to do so because we have come far short of articulating and understanding the gravity and effect of these crimes. Perhaps if the effects were clearer, more broadly conceived, then we can unleash the full wrath of our terrible societal engines against all such transgressors.

We haven’t done this already because, sadly enough, we apparently need more than emotion to govern our laws and policies about sexual abuse of children. Let’s stop looking at abuse just through dewy-eyed sentimentality about children. Instead, look at abuse in terms of the hard, cold logic of practical societal survival: Children we don’t protect grow up. Those ice-cold stares from prisoners were once the hopeful glimpses of little kids. Those kids often never had a chance, yet their experiences affect our world in immeasurable ways.

I would like some researchers to conduct a massive meta-study of all the screwed-up people. All the dictators and molesters and thieves and murderers and wife-beaters. How many of these people were abused as children and never shook that trauma, and in that peculiar, agonizing human tendency, rather than see their experience as the last thing they would ever do, instead perpetuate the same kind of horrors on another? We know intuitively this is long-standing human behavior, but we seem to need more proof.

Victims can and do overcome when they have the supportive structures in place. But when they don’t or can’t move past the terrible theft of their childhood, they create a cascade of expensive woe and destruction. As Philadelphia Inquirer public health blogger Jonathan Purtle writes, people who suffer abuse are prone to many overall health problems, problems that affect nearly every aspect of our culture.

That anyone would mull over the consequences (trying to save their own pathetic skins?) of reporting a molesting priest or rapist coach shows, as Purtle says, how “few people really understand the devastating consequences of sexual abuse.” Your silence is a crime against humanity, only worsened by your effort to hide such abuse and protect any pervert.

If we thought about it like that, maybe people would get out the torches and pitchforks. However much I enjoy Scott Stein’s occasional column about people who should be killed on this site, I have trouble ideologically supporting the death penalty because of the obvious bureaucratic problems with state-administered executions. But if we viewed the scope and effect of abuse more broadly and accurately, we could certainly create better, more severe laws punishing abusers and anyone who sustains them.

We need better laws driven by a clearer mindset about the perpetuation of destruction child abuse breeds, laws that put in action the full force of the U.S. judicial machine and that help inculcate stronger collective values about abuse. I could get behind a political platform about this, framed around the simple idea that sexually abused children grow up. Then what? In Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Coriolanus, the brutal title character’s son, Young Martius, is raised in the same bloodthirsty way as his father. The child ponders a threat, saying, “A shall not tread on me./I’ll run away till I am bigger, but then I’ll fight.” Children will some day have an effect on the world. Do we want that effect to be revenge?

We share feelings of vengeance about the candy-toting scumbag trolling for child victims. But we need legal clarity about a person in a position of authority and trust with children who uses that position to find victims; that person deserves a codified level of societal wrath akin to nothing else. And if you protect those people, from walking away from a child rape to helping a molester move to a new position, you are an accomplice in creating a potential cascade of societal damage that may resonate for generations. You will be punished.

The monsters who molest children will always be the focus of our disgust. But if we see this as a crime against humanity that has unique resonant effects, maybe then anyone who protects them will receive the same level of disgust — and thus no one will ever hide this awful crime, regardless of the consequences of disclosure.