One Long Digression?

A big problem for some people is the inability to distinguish attention from affection.

I think that Amanda was one of these people. Maybe it's unfair that that's the first thing to spring to mind. I'm probably one of them, too.

So much for not saying too much too early with Beth. I cannot participate in type-written conversations of any emotional kind with anyone, I feel, because when I'm writing my thoughts don't have the same filter that they do when I'm speaking.

I guess what's more likely is that it adds a certain filter and adds a certain time to think and devise a well-thought response. Maybe sometimes, in "matters of the heart," a well-thought response is not what you want. I'm more willing to divulge. Even though I understand that the person who I'm typing with is there, somewhere, alive, and processing what I'm saying, there's no visual contact of any sort, and the desire to say whatever the fuck comes to mind, without having to attempt any kind of affect of face or speech (or being able to) to color it.

Watching the Devil's Advocate last night, which stars Al Pacino, playing Satan, as the nefarious head of a major midtown law firm involved in--it goes without saying--very evil things, begged the question: is what I'm doing evil? Is it evil of me to work for a law firm? Are lawyers themselves evil?

My first instinct was to say back to myself that the question was so absurd that I won't even dignify this thought with an answer.

To circumscribe the argument a little bit though, I feel comfortable saying this: even if there were such a thing called "evil," and even if this "evil" did resemble the evil a typical non-Heathen (Jew, Christian, or Arab) understands, the lawyers who I've met are not evil.

Not a single one of them.

Not Christine Chi. Maybe especially not Christine Chi. It actually frustrates me that I've been unable to connect with the Chi, because I feel there's a lot to be understood and learned in that crazy dome of hers. But digress.

Unsurprisingly, the movie paints the conflict between good and evil in pretty black and white strokes, and the legal industry appears to come out on the "completely evil" side of the balance. Meanwhile, the crazy evangelistic mother of Keanu Reeve's wife, who warns him, cryptically, zealously, "I send thee out as a sheep among the wolves," along with the wrist-slashing wife herself, are the saints of the movie. Those who have seen that episode of Upright Citizens' Brigade cannot help but think "A river of lamb's blood" when they hear the mother say this. Funny stuff. Here, the writers make the audience's choices pretty damn easy, as Reeves represents the a womanizing wife-murderer who is unrepentant and a liar to boot.

The tax shelter industry, though--which apparently I'm a part of, in that I'm helping a prominent international bank to retain the profits in made in these legally and ethically questionable transactions--has its own sinister moments. There can be no doubt of this. These were concerted efforts, it would seem, not to break the law, and certainly not to flout it, as has been suggested by some Senators--but merely to circumvent it. Which is something like ignoring, but requires more effort and less respect for the thing being circumvented. And here, of course, there is a substantial component of exploitation of the common American taxpayer who pays H&R block a larger percentage of income they're working to produce to knock a couple of percentage points off a rate that saps their paycheck at a crippling to pay for a bunch of things they can't see for people they don't know.

And this is not a mini-rant against the bluebloods of this country. For a good number of these, I think, contribution to society and community really has become a priority, and paying their way, whether in taxes and tuition, is a badge of pride, and of course, of worth. Rather, it tends to be the nouveau-riche of every stripe, first generation millionaires who all are richer than they ever thought they would be, and want to keep every stinking penny they possibly can, however they must. This is how most of them have made millionaires of themselves. There are dot-com entrepreneurs who created some bogus company in their garage and sold it for millions before the bubble burst. There are people who distribute pork bellies. There are world-class professional athletes. I've seen fortunes that have been made in both boxing and baseball. We're going against the owners of professional sport teams; we're going against the guy who pay the baseball players. These are the same people, though I won't name names--who rename the Anaheim Angels 'The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim' in order to gain merchandise revenue, despite the fact that, as many have pointed out, Los Angeles and Anaheim are, um, not the same place. These people are trying to make that money, and they're willing to stretch the fabric of reality, if they have to, to squeeze out every last drop. And the tax code is built to drip, just as it's designed to retain water.

Inefficiency and corruption are built into every economic and political system. They are themselves industries within every industry. Without them, we'd be lost. They generate a lot of money and, one could argue, distribute more evenly and completely than a system that was perfectly efficient. What would we do without inefficiency and corruption? Unemployment would skyrocket! We'd have somebody like Ken Jennings running the country. Money would only get spent on things that are boring. No more missile defense here. More homeland security. More fourth of July. Fewer fireworks. Presumably, this lack of inefficiency and corruption would spread to the religious sector, being as close at it is to the political and business sectors, which, presumably, are the first to be infected. And then Americans would head back to churches and temples in droves! There would be fewer tort lawsuits against priests. There would be fewer abused children. Lawyers would make less money. Insurers would make less money. Very scary stuff, man. And, oh yeah, everyone would take Ritalin.