why dave bergman is neat

pistons winning streak now at 7 after a 94-88 victory over golden state.

hi. i would just like to point out that today is my one-year blogging anniversary.

that's right--just one short year ago today, the dave bergman adventure began.

and we probably have just as many readers now as we did then, meaning: i can probably count all our readers on my fingers.

but that's ok--it's QUALITY, not quantity, folks.

also, i believe today is the one-year anniversary of our gil prose comp midterm, where gil got us going in the direction of fear with his astounding downness--right, dennis?

for those of you who care, there has been some trouble stirring over at the conservative philosopher due to some massive silliness from the blog's founder, who shut down comments in part because their overall quality was 'poor'. this is demonstrably false, or would have been, if he hadn't obliterated all previous comments from the face of the earth. but KBJ seems quite sensitive, and seems to think any disagreement with his bald assertions (for a 'philosophy' blog, they were often surprisingly lacking in supporting argument; see here, for example) is a personal attack (which he shows that he himself is not above here).

at any rate, this caused the departure of one of my favorite contributors, max goss, now added on the right (in hoc signo vinces). see here for some of the drama. KBJ then responded in a rather vindictive manner here, prompting another response from max here. then, another contributor to TCP, jim ryan, resigned this morning.

all that is to say--apparently there is another conservative philosophical group blog in the works, one which, i hope, will remain open to discussion and not cry 'foul' and fall back on credentials every time there is a disagreement. i'll keep you updated.

UPDATE: it looks as though robert c. koons, another TCP favorite, has left. that ship could be sinking fast.

P.P.S.: the dave just got linked on another sight! SWEET! also, at least one other contributor to TCP is gone. is this the way TCP ends--not with a bang, but a whimper?

P.P.P.S.: steve burton is also no longer affiliated with TCP.

P.P.P.P.S.: looks like yet another one is gone. and then there were twelve...

PISTONS DEFEAT KNICKS 97-88, sans coach.

richard john neuhaus has an interesting article on a new book by david klinghoffer.

HUNTER THOMPSON COMMITS SUICIDE (LvM).

R.I.P.

so i've been a little behind the times lately and didn't realize that richard buckner came out with a new album on october 12 of last year. the editorial review on amazon refers to mr. buckner as 'peripatetic'. i heard the first track, called 'a chance counsel', on the radio last night (not long after hearing some blind blake!), and it sounded good.

MORE FROM THE CHRONICLES OF MY LIFE: i got a free piece of coffee cake this morning.

that's right, folks. it's spring training time again. and after a couple of big signings in the off-season, the tigers have winning in mind.

i've noticed that people often use these things to talk about their own lives, so i figured maybe i should too. so here's something:

i haven't changed my pants yet this week.

tonight i heard on the radio that kobe bryant is going to be called as a character witness for michael jackson.

enough said?

some interesting comments here and here on medicare reform from richard posner and gary becker. an excerpt from posner:

The real issue is not the prescription-drug benefit but the overall cost of Medicare; currently (that is, without the prescription-drug benefit) that cost is running at almost $300 billion a year, which is about 3 percent of GDP. As a matter of economic principle (and I think social justice as well), Medicare should be abolished. Then the principal government medical-payment program would be Medicaid, a means-based system of social insurance that is part of the safety net for the indigent.

arthur miller (1915-2005) has died: R.I.P.

LIFTED FROM THE CAMPUS: my dad pointed me to this fascinating story in the toledo blade:

Scarborough: An American hero of the mind

DETROIT - This is the story of one of black history's amazing unknown pioneers, a slave who, against all odds, rose to become the foremost black classical scholar, a major voice in the debate over the future of black America and, finally, president of Wilberforce University.

And it is the story of a young white woman, born long after he died, who found his fascinating autobiography tucked away and forgotten, and who has just given William Sanders Scarborough's incredible life back to the nation after it was somehow tragically lost for decades.

"He was an American hero of the mind," Michelle Valerie Ronnick said. "His story remains living proof that if you work hard, aim high, and dream big dreams, you can overcome tremendous obstacles."

Thanks to her own hard work, Wayne State University Press has just published his book. The Autobiography of William Sanders Scarborough: An American Journey From Slavery to Scholarship (425 pages; $29.95).

Her achievement, like that of her subject, has been hailed as nothing short of brilliant by Henry Louis Gates, the famous scholar and critic.

Though they are separated by race, gender, and more than a century, the black pioneer and the young scholar have something in common. No one would have expected either to become experts in ancient tongues.

Growing up in Florida in the 1970s, Michele Ronnick took Latin as a senior in high school mainly because her brother liked the teacher. It started her on a lifelong passion for the classics.

Nobody would ever have expected Scarborough to become a scholar - let alone a leading expert on Greek and Latin. When he was growing up, it was illegal to teach blacks to read or write. U.S. Sen. John C. Calhoun, the famous fire-eating defender of slavery, once said that if he "could find a Negro who knew the Greek syntax, he would then believe the Negro was a human being."

Scarborough, who surreptitiously was taught to read, ended up not just knowing that ancient language fluently, he became the author of a Greek college textbook widely used in the late 19th century.

He rose to become an amazing example who fought hardship all his life; never took no for an answer, and who wasn't content to be a trailblazer in merely academic circles.

He dabbled in Ohio politics and fought Booker T. Washington's idea that African-Americans should be content to learn industrial arts and not worry about cultivating the life of the mind.

And William Scarborough was witness to some of the greatest moments of his time. He was a 12-year-old boy in Atlanta when the city was sacked by William Tecumseh Sherman. (When blacks were allowed to do some looting, he tellingly went after, he says, "pencils, envelopes, and paper.")

He saw Jefferson Davis dragged away as a prisoner of war; met Richard Wright and Frederick Douglass; knew Warren G. Harding, and attended Booker T. Washington's funeral.

He fell in love with a white divorcee when that was social suicide; they married in 1881, and lived happily ever after for 45 years.

Then, in the fall of 1926, he died, after struggling into his library for one last look at his beloved books. Shortly before he had finished writing an autobiography, to which his heartbroken wife added a few pages. But it was never published, and it and he were finally forgotten.

Meanwhile, Michelle Ronnick had gone on to become an expert on Roman literature, and ended up as part of the tiny classics department at this sprawling urban school.

Eight years ago, doing research, she came across a reference to one William Scarborough. It said he was African-American, a former slave, and was the author of a textbook of ancient Greek.

What amazed her was that she had never heard of him. Her interest was piqued. Then, after a lot of digging, she discovered a treasure trove: A copy of his autobiography, forgotten, in the Ohio Historical Society archives. For some reason, it had never been published. As she began to read, she was hooked.

Wayne State University Press has just published the manuscript. It reveals a black man who was a straight-laced Victorian; who was always proper, but whose remarkable life puts most of us to shame.

"I have never been ashamed of my birth conditions," he says succinctly. "I have left that to the slaveholders."

Shortly before he died nearly a century ago, Professor William Sanders Scarborough finished his memoir, writing, "I look ahead into years to come, when the melting pot - America - will have melted away racial lines, hates, and prejudices … a thing this country owes to its honor."

We can only guess what he would have thought today. But I think it might be something like what I heard a minister say once during a service in the African Methodist Episcopal Church to which the old professor belonged.

"Lord, we're not what we should be. We're not what we could be and we're not what we are going to be. But at least we're not what we were."
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Jack Lessenberry, a member of the journalism faculty at Wayne State University in Detroit and The Blade’s ombudsman, writes on issues and people in Michigan.
» E-mail him at OMBLADE@aol.com or call 1-888-746-8610.
» Read more Jack Lessenberry columns at www.toledoblade.com/lessenberry