They Will Rise Again From the Tundra

Hitchens at The Amazing Meeting in Las Vegas, NV (January 2007)*

This will be as useless and banal as any obituary or tribute, not only because memorializing a person’s life is, in its own way, an act of barbarism, but because I am limited in what I’ve read of Hitchens’s work to his last eight or so years’ worth of essays.  I’ve not read God is Not Great, nor have I read Arguably.  I will, but that’s not the point.  Reading one Christopher Hitchens essay should be enough for any reader to realize, without doubt, that they are drinking deep the work of a virtuoso, a true master of written English, and a wit unparalleled by any of his contemporaries.  When he died last night, the world lost perhaps its finest living prose writer.

I have always marveled at Hitchens’s fearlessness.  A person can be born with intelligence, … Read more

Lethal Injection Chamber*

The following list of articles skews toward the anti-death-penalty persuasion, and does not hit every cogent point, pro or con, regarding capital punishment.  How could it?  But the furor over Troy Davis’ execution the other day—as well as some back-and-forth with fellow Sloth Jockey blogger Vinnie Bergl—has the topic fresh in my head.  I don’t know whether Troy Davis was innocent or guilty; I don’t know whether doubt over his innocence or guilt was a false impression given by the media.  For purposes of the following post, and the questions it asks, Troy Davis’ specific case doesn’t really inform the greater question:  is the death penalty ever justified in a civilized society?

I’m against capital punishment for what some might consider a simplistic reason: that, when doling out an absolute punishment, one innocent killed at the hands of the state is one too many.  I’m also sympathetic … Read more

Easter isn’t exactly a day I relish in any capacity, and on this Easter Sunday, I am, perhaps, more irritable than usual.  This patch on my arm is feeding nicotine into my bloodstream to the tune of 21 milligrams over a 24-hour period for the sixth day in a row with no telling how long it will be before I pass a single minute bereft of longing for a cigarette.

I am, on this day, reminded of the fervid retellings of Jesus’ resurrection and ascension into Heaven that rattled down the hallways of my Catholic high school and how odd it was to be an atheist tucked in among the pious masses.  The rub is, of course, that piety is almost uniformly non-existent among teenagers.  Even the classmates of mine renowned for their adherence to the Church defied the constraints of Catholicism’s unrealistic dogma, most likely by engaging in rigorous … Read more