Liberal Episcopalian

The Not Romney

2012-01-10T22:26:00.001-05:00

A lot of attention has been put on the "Not Romney" vote. Partly because it is a real thing in elections for an alternative candidate to develop and partly because there is a sizable Republican opposition to Mitt Romney. But one dimension never seems to come up: the three Republican subgroups.

The Not Romney vote is not monolithic, and it is hard to imagine anyone but Romney winning, but there is a very real, very important battle going on through this primary. Which Republican subgroup is in charge. Is it The Intellectual Right? Or The Moral Minutes? Or The Conservative Libertarians? Or The Neocons? Oh, who am I kidding! They won't nominate a neocon. But, the strangely unexamined "Tea Party Vote" is made up of the strange bedfellows of conservative libertarians obsessed with reducing the influence of government to the pebble each individual carries around in his pocket as a souvenir of his own liberation and the social conservatives who are eager to ramrod government into every issue of sexuality while forcing "tough love" on the poor. Pundits seem to be utterly oblivious to the obviously conflicting political systems.

Romney occupies the space of The Intellectual Right. They've already ordained him to be their guy. The problem is that The Moral Minutes hate him and the Conservative Libertarians hate him. And, as Iowa and now New Hampshire are showing, the "Not Romney" vote can't rally to one opponent yet. The CLs won't go to Rick Santorum, since he is more Washington and more "big government" than Romney. He is also far too socially conservative for the free-wheelin' libertarian set. And for as much as many MMs might like what Ron Paul has to say about government, he doesn't care about their core issues: sex, sex, and sex.

With a decent showing in NH, Jon Huntsman might make a play on the "I'm white bread like Romney, but I don't taste like confliction" image and could find himself positioned as the close-enough-to-be-but-good-thing-he's-not Romney vote.

But the early results show another strong showing for Ron Paul. Which begs the much better question than who is the Not Romney candidate: Would the GOP really go full-on libertarian? Movement conservatives have been hard driving the economic policies in that direction for the last decade. So is this the time? And what would happen to the Moral Minutes? What happens to the GOP if it is no longer the broad conservative party, but the narrow conservative libertarian party? And why doesn't the media seem to think this is even possible? Have they slept through the last three years? If there ever was a time for the conservative base to reject the Intellectual Right's pick, it is now.

Fill in post

2012-01-08T13:24:00.000-05:00

Here is my Technorati code: XAZWJQVJZDN9. It is only relevant to the search robot that Technorati uses to determine if this is really my site. Once it deems me to, in fact, be me, then I will remove it. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Newt's Singular Advantage

2011-12-17T18:09:00.000-05:00

In the Republican field for president, much has been made of the not-Romney vote's titanic swings around the field gesticulating wildly toward whomever looks less like Mitt. Few acknowledge the two important pieces that make up that vote: the hard-liners and the haters. The hard-liners being the Tea Party crowd that want a firebrand in office and the haters are the ones who really want ABR (Anybody But Rommey). But fewer still are admitting one trait of Newt's that could land him a plum seat at the dance: he is known for being someone "who has ideas". And at a time like this, that matters more than anything.

My own experience shows what happens when things look grim: we look at the guy who isn't just smartest, but the guy who has "ideas". The one who has the big plan to get us out of a mess. We want the silver bullet that will change everything. We want, we demand, that our leaders come up with such a plan.

None of the people running have given out a real plan, a specific-enough-sounding plan, to make us go "Yes!" but one will come. When Herman Cain said "9-9-9" people went "Ooooh! Shiny baubles! This man has a plan!" Then of course, his plan was ripped to shreds for being ridiculous. But people supported him for a couple of weeks after that, simply because he had a weird plan! He had an idea!

Enter: Newt. The man known for having ideas. Known for throwing random stuff at a wall and seeing what sticks. It helps that he debates well and doesn't look lost under the bright lights. It helps that Evangelicals are willing to overlook a truly despicable personal character and a disturbing lust for power. He has been in Washington and out (sort of). Really, he isn't the absurd candidate he is taken for.

The one feather in his cap; the one he is saving; is one that would be really, really important in a general election against the seemingly pragmatic President Obama. He comes up with ideas. And people think nobody in Washington is doing that. As long as Newt has that secret weapon, there is nothing Romney can do to secure the nomination without a bloody battle to the end.

It's Reagan, Stupid!

2011-11-21T14:42:00.001-05:00

When are the people going to point out that economic inequality, the principles that crashed the economy, and the political circus that has embroiled the last couple of years can all be traced to one strangely popular political figure? A figure who, while running for president, was told that his economic theories were "voodoo economics"? A figure who frequently abandoned those policies during his time in office to actually save us from his tax cuts by raising taxes? A figure who is so adored by his disciples that they are completely ignorant of much of what his presidency entailed?

Unfortunately, most people won't bring up the specter of Ronald Reagan because the memory of him is so beatified through rosy glasses of total ignorance. The only parts of Reaganomics that were worked were, at best, tweaks of ongoing, mainstream thinking. Everything else, the parts about privatizations, unregulating, union-busting, and tax cutting led to no more than modest growth while simultaneously ballooning debt, and dramatically redistributing wealth to the tippity-top of the wealth pile. The basic philosophy has been discredited by most honest economists.

And yet, this philosophy is seemingly stronger now than at any point since 1981! I fear that this is due to two things:

The Reagan Cult: The slavish, cultish devotion to Reaganomics despite the insurmountable evidence should be more shocking, but it isn't even surprising. The cult does not begin with the real Reagan presidency, however, but with the theory that it should work because we believe it will. The cult then goes and rewrites history to somehow blame the Great Depression on those that dragged us out of it kicking and screaming.
The Rand Cover: The other reason is that Reagan's popularity gives cover for many conservatives to espouse economic rationales that don't come from Reagan, but from Ayn Rand. Her extreme support, not only of greed, but of super, strata-elites that would magically bestow the illusion of equality upon the world with magic pixie dust because, after all, generous people are truly evil and the selfish are morally good.

It doesn't really matter which it is, because the current economic conditions date to the excessive debt-creation that began under Reagan through tax cuts and unregulated environments that led to more corporate consolidation than to price reductions. The two platforms of the last 30 years that were supported by Republicans and slightly modified by Democrats in the 1990s. But the whole structure is corrupt. The only way for us to get out of our current economic and political morass is by dealing with its source. No matter how unpopular that prospect is. And the source of the problem is Ronald Reagan.

If Corporations Are On Strike, Then Bust Them

2011-11-14T15:02:00.001-05:00

“Job creators are essentially on strike."

Those words, intended to strike fear in the hearts of thecountry, while also delivered with a reminder that what will stabilize thecountry is hope and optimism, were delivered by House Speaker John Boehner in aspeech today.

Boehner named what liberals have been saying for the lasttwo years: that businesses aren’t hiringon purpose. Now, he is making thetired claim that it has to do with “economic uncertainty” which has alwaysbegged the question about when the mythical “economic certainty” actuallyoccurred in the modern era. And yet, heis still making the claim. Boehner’sanalogy is pitch perfect…for Democrats. It’s simple: he opened the foundation for the Republican position byusing labor terms. The pieces are there:

Republicans have long used union-busting as an excuse foreconomic growth.
They worship President Ronald Reagan’s ghost for busting theProfessional Air Traffic Controllers Organization.
Boehner, perhaps unintentionally, has invoked a vision ofwealthy, multinational corporations as unions.

So if corporations are on strike, then how about bustingthem! Here’s how:

Have the country strike competitive fear into the hearts ofcorporations by going toe-to-toe with the banks and energy companies with newpublic utilities,
Hiring scores of workers, proving that corporations aren’tactually job creators,
And enforce the communications laws and laws of incorporationthat are on the books.

If we are to trust that multinational corporations are theonly job creators, that laissez faire economics is the rule, and that openmarkets are the only way, then let’s actually see how they compete with thegovernment. Will they innovate and proveus wrong? Great! We’ll have jobs! If they fail, then at least we still havejobs! This is a win-win situation.

Otherwise, maintaining our current situation by allowing corporationsto be “essentially on strike” and doing nothing about it is entirely lose-lose. Or at least lose-lose for the 99%. In the “economically uncertain” times oftoday, the 1% are raking it in.

The pieces are there: who will pick them up?

P.S. Read the Plum Line's "Two sentences from John Boehner's speech".

Colbert and the ridiculousness of voter fraud

2011-11-01T16:07:00.001-04:00

The Colbert Report
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The Gilded Age of Media

2011-10-15T01:19:00.001-04:00

When faced with something they find confusing, most journalists give up. They don’t do the real legwork of engaging the story. They write the “process story” instead. You’ve read the kind in which the author doesn’t actually write the story about the intended subject’s work, but how confusing that work is. They trot out tired tropes about nails and Jello and hammering something when they should be spending a few minutes actually engaging the material. I’m just saying.

So we’ve now spent the last four weeks hearing from the news media that Occupy Wall Street has this messaging problem and “nobody” can explain what they want. [Hello! They actually wrote a document forever ago!] Blah blah. Some stuff about how they have no goals or direction. Blah blah. Then something about what Republicancongresspersons say about them. Blah blah. Then some personal anecdote revealing the journalist’s secret disdain for anything outside the norm of beltway horserace-jargonedpolitics. Totally lazy and inappropriate.

Here’s the problem:

In late 2009, when people started a movement chanting the famous Reagan quote: “Government is not the solution to our problems, government is the problem” while complaining about having that said government collect any taxes at all, but were also (apparently) satisfied with the current tax rates (taxed enough already?), the media fawned all over them and now talk about the consistency of their message.

In late 2011, when people started a movement changing the famous Reagan quote to say: “Wall Street is not the solution to our problems, Wall Street is the problem” while complaining about said Wall Street’s collective dramatic windfall over the last 30 years at the expense of, well, virtually the entire country, suggesting we raise taxes on the top 1% and alter the lax regulated environment, the media got flummoxed and stared at each other totally confused and dumfounded. What are they talking about? It sounds like complete gibberish!

Clearly the media has swallowed the blue pill and decided that a message that is anti-government and inconsistent about taxes is clear and concise, while a message that is anti-Wall Street excess and social contract devastation is some massive word jumble. Clearly, the Tea Party, which began with the fervor of some ideological firebrands that are strongly libertarian was long ago co-opted into long-term conservative think tank arguments. That the Tea Party is at once referencing both grassroots libertarians and die- hard social conservatives who have been in Washington for two decades should be more confusing to pundits. And yet that message is taken for granted: it is not only domesticated, it is normal. Average. The way of conservative politics these days.

At the same time, the media is loath to examine the very substance of this rhetoric, instead, they would rather spend their time writing the horserace story about which Republican is up in the polls. If they are forced to cover the #Occupy movement, they’ll just phone in a process story. I mean, really, who wants to deal with the actual substance of income inequality and corporate greed. That’s so…quaint.

Welcome to the new Gilded Age.

Google’s missed opportunity

2011-09-29T01:05:00.001-04:00

According to some, Google+ is the purest gold and to others, it is already dead. Personally, I don’t care one way or the other. But I do believe that Google aimed too far inside the box.

Now, I haven’t played enough with Google+ and haven’t sought all the different ways to jury-rig it to act like the Facebook which I claim to detest but hope to replicate. Nor would I flock to it simply because (God forbid) Facebook updated itself. But the problem isn’t with what Google+ is, it is what it isn’t. Or, more appropriately, that it is. Let me explain.

Google is known for innovation. In fact, after Apple, only Google comes to mind in the “most innovative” category. So when Google was sitting on the sidelines during the massive blowup of Facebook, now with 800 million people, with a recent day logging in 500 million different users in a single day, it seemed strange that Google wasn’t taking part.

And then they did. They took part by trying to build another Facebook. That’s not innovative enough. Circles are great. Yeah, it is like Twitter and Facebook integrated. Woo. I sort of have that already. Expansion is not innovation.

Google is the only company with enough users already to take on Facebook, but the problem is that very 20^th Century thinking of “taking on” one’s “competitors”. In Web 2.1, Google and Facebook aren’t supposed to be competitors; at least not in the Industrial Revolution, Enlightenment sense. They aren’t supposed to beat each other up; they’re supposed to out-innovate the other.

That is Google’s missed opportunity with Google+. Everyone has a Facebook account. And nearly everyone has a Google account. Google doesn’t need much else, but to build their account to integrate with everything. They should make the Google ID into the universal access card. One identity everywhere. Let Facebook have its playground. Google should be playing in every playground.

Here’s how it would work and why it is different from Google+. Before there was Google+, you just stayed logged in to Google all the time. You could use Buzz to communicate and blog at Blogger and all of that. But all that Google really needed to do was to beef up the Google ID. Make it ubiquitous. Make it plug in everywhere.

The first awesome use of this idea is really simple, really cool, and totally uninvasive: About.me. A simple site that lets you put up a virtual business card. Mine is right here. Go take a look and come right back. I’ll wait.

From About.me, you can look up all of the places I am online. The site integrates with all of the big social media services so it easily allows people to integrate with me. In the dashboard, it uses analytics to keep track of how many views you get and all of that. I love this site and think it has incredible potential. And to be fair, Google should just buy it and beef it up. But this is what Google should have done with social media.

A similar innovation is the blogging platform, Posterous (click here to see mine, though you might be reading it there...). It is a cross between blogger and tumblr, but it integrates with everything and lets you post once and send it out everywhere. Very powerful and simple.

This is where Google should have gone. Don’t rebuild the Model T from the ground up. Make the Model T one of the cars on the lot.

And the kicker is that they could have just done this. No big Google+ roll out, no red carpet entrance, no glitzy Facebook-is-so-passe articles about beating each other up after class. Just use what you’ve got to totally remake the ground under the playground.

Of course, it is still early. Google hasn’t shown all of their cards. And they certainly are open to trying many different strategies, and as we’ve seen recently, pluck them after they’ve withered. Right now, Google+ is not a bad business move, and may lead to the next innovation, but Google could have done so much more.

Smirk

2011-09-18T21:36:00.001-04:00

Car Lust

2011-09-15T16:00:00.001-04:00

I have fallen head-over-heals for this concept car. Seriously. Take a look at it:

You may think I'm crazy, but not since the Lamborghini Countach spun its wheels into my imagination in the 80's has a car looked so freakin' cool. It's called the Ford Evos and it's even a plug-in hybrid! Man, that's cool!

Shadow

2011-09-14T23:41:00.001-04:00

Posing for the camera this morning

2011-09-14T23:33:00.001-04:00

My big girl

2011-09-14T23:24:00.001-04:00

What if China fails?

2011-08-15T16:15:00.000-04:00

I was sitting in Barnes & Noble a few weeks ago and some book title I can no longer remember caught my eye. It made me think of this question: what if China fails? It got me thinking. What if the Chinese economy collapsed today? What would it mean for all of us here?

This is particularly important in light of the excuses given for the trumped up debt debate (a blatant excuse to impose an austerity economy) when it began in April. These massive loans are being taken out from the Chinese! Won’t the Chinese inevitably overtake us the global superpower? Fear our Chinese overlords!

So I got to thinking about that and the irony of the Chinese superpower equation demands that the Chinese economy grows while ours...

For full story, go here.

Austerity...mmm, smells pretty rancid

2011-08-15T16:03:00.000-04:00

So, the debt debacle is over and everyone has declared their winners and losers and moved on. I haven't. Not just because I can't get over it, but because I'm still waiting for the reaction that I had in all of this: we've chosen the wrong path.

Despite the fact that everybody is pissed off at the deal itself and even more pissed off at the process, we haven't gotten down to the real reason why we should be pissed off: the reasoning behind making this a debate in the first place. The ideology. That ideology of austerity and it is a classically conservative economic approach.

Yes, liberals should be pissed because the president and the Democratic leadership demonstrated a willingness to even make a deal in the first place, allowing this to become a thing and not simply a clean vote about the debt ceiling. Yes, conservatives have some right to be pissed off for not getting everything they wanted, I suppose; not to mention the economic downgrade. But here is the thing we should all be pissed off about: we never had a real conversation about austerity. Democrats and Republicans fought about how much austerity we should have, but we never talked about whether or not it was a good idea. And with dozens of polls coming out in the last couple of weeks demonstrating a super majority of Americans opposing austerity, at least in the unbalanced cut-only approach, even showing majorities of Republicans opposing it, we should be livid. Again, not because of "process" and "Washington" and "politics" and "sausage-making", but because they flat-out ignored our demands. They refused to do what we asked for: tax increases on the wealthy. They refused to use an approach that would preserve future growth in the national and local economies, favoring instead one that would lead to only painful cuts. This will as certainly lead to job losses not unlike those occurring in all the states that have cut back. What economists have been asking for is more stimulus, not cutting back.

So here's the deal. An ideology has been adopted without reasonable debate that will impede job growth, slow financial growth for the national economy, and will continue to lead to market volatility at a moment of tremendous uncertainty. And that ideology is conservative in origin. This is the long-term win for the Republican Party. Just as begun in the the late 1970s, liberals have cared more about the process of governing, focusing their attention on the minutia of winning small debates and specific elections by appealing to a fickle group of dual-minded voters in the mythical "center", while conservatives have spent that same time waging a war for ideological supremacy through clubs and universities and the growth of the conservative brand. As president, Bill Clinton adopted a pretty classic conservative economic policy and spearheaded a generation of "neo-liberals" into a world of bubbles and massive deregulation. With that timeline, this move into austerity is like punching the ball into the end zone. Now what will liberals do with possession and a 7-point deficit?

Leaving Nana at the airport

2011-08-03T14:16:00.000-04:00

My Mom has been visiting us for the last two weeks. It was a Godsend. Rose and I needed a break and some help and the opportunity to relax. My Mom was great at this: Sophia stuck by her side the whole visit and we even had a few opportunities to go out! We went to two movies in two weeks: a big deal for parents of a preschooler. Today was our last morning, and the two of them got one more walk in before we left. By late morning…

For full story, go here.

The coming Republican civil war

2011-08-02T16:55:00.000-04:00

I honestly have never seen so much coverage of an issue as we saw about the debt ceiling over the last three months. The funny thing is that the coverage was all filtered through a lens of partisan bickering, rather than the more honest assessment:

Tea Party Republicans didn’t want to rubberstamp the deal
Mainstream Republicans saw the opportunity to make a deal out of a rubberstamp issue
Democrats tried to get enough votes to pay bills for money already spent for something that previous Republican presidents (including the beloved Reagan) got rubberstamped

But most of the media is obsessed with this as “partisanship” and “bickering” when it wasn’t, and is dishonest if presented as such.

A few journalists have been speaking out about how bad the journalism has been throughout this conversation, but they are in the minority. And now that it is finalized, maybe we can turn our attention to what the House Speaker was actually doing. He was stuck between a debt default and splitting his political force in half. Unlike the Senate Minority Leader, who seemed eager to play the role of spoiler, Speaker Boehner was put into a position to actually reject a dream bill offered up to him by the president. Much attention has gone to Grover Norquist’s role in getting no-new-taxes pledges from all of the Republicans in Congress, but little is being made of that fractured constituency in light of any inevitable compromise.

Of course the smart money should have been on pushing through something solid in the Senate, knowing enough Republicans would buckle and getting every Democrat to go along with it. This would have caused some stress on Boehner and the Congresspersons that would vote for it. But in dividing the House, Boehner won’t be able to go back and say, they made us eat this to stave off default while aiding the people he had fall on the sword. He is left trying to unify a traditional half that sees this as a big win and a Tea Party half that no doubt still thinks he caved anyway and should be removed.

The politically bloody primary season has only just begun and the battle between Bachmann and Romney seems already set as a proxy for the Tea Party vs. Traditional GOP. I can’t help but imagine that this is about to get interesting during the August vacation.

When GOD doesn't provide

2011-07-31T16:06:00.001-04:00

If you say the phrase “God will provide” in the Downs house, you’ll likely get your mouth taped shut. Not by me, but by my wife: she’s the pragmatist. “God doesn’t pay the electric bill!” she’ll retort.

For more, click here

Why is bad meat cheap?

2011-07-30T16:09:00.000-04:00

Walking toward the back of Kroger to buy some ground beef, one notices very quickly that the expensive stuff is on the left and degrades as you move to the right.

On the far left is Laura’s Lean Beef. It is organic and farm-raised, and 93% fat free. It is $5.49 per pound.
To it’s right is lean beef, 93% fat free. Who knows where it’s from: $4.49 per pound.
Next is ground sirloin at 90% fat free. It claims to be Angus: $4.69 per pound.
Then there’s ground round at 85% fat free. Doesn’t make any claims: $3.99 per pound.
Then ground chuck at 80% fat free. Yum: $3.39 per pound
And of course, there’s hamburger at 75%. That tasty stuff is ¼ fat (or at least I hope that’s what makes up that 25%): On sale for$2.58 per pound. Or $2.38 if you buy it in a tube!

As I am staring at these choices and thinking about the cost and the benefits, I also notice the other option. Sitting at the bottom is a massive foam package of pounds and pounds of hamburger…

For more, click here.

How to make a political issue out of agreement

2011-06-21T10:00:00.002-04:00

If we were all as ideologically consistent as we believe we are, there would really only be a few things we’d argue about. Thank goodness we’re hypocrites! But in many cases, something happens that causes us to divide over an issue that we nearly always agree upon; and it usually involves siding with a friend.

Now, I don’t expect this to be the next great political issue, or the thing that will swing the 2012 election, and I’m not pretending it is, but I think it can serve as a good example of the difference between ideology and politics—and why the left/right dynamic is ridiculous.

The issue is about a background check company for social media, storing everything you’ve ever done on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, et al. for up to seven years. We have already been warned of the “dangers” of the internet age and Web 2.0 and how nothing ever really gets deleted, but this company, and the FTC ruling that it is fair and appropriate highlights a slippery slope that neither liberals or conservatives would be crazy about. For liberals, the idea that one’s personal liberty is being infringed or that mistakes cannot be truly taken back is chilling. For conservatives, the idea that someone/-thing is tracking you and may be used by a government agency is offensive. There is real common ground between the two ideologies around personal rights.

There are, however, two groups that hear this and get excited. The first, of course, are corporations—particularly CEOs and HR people that are looking for the ideal solution to weed out workers. This, of course is a tiny part of the population, but they have a great megaphone (according to the Supreme Court) in the form of big bank accounts. The other is the well-just-don’t-use-Facebook types. The people that see the solution to restricted liberties as an opportunity to make everyone step back to where they already are. You know; the person who doesn’t mind about the ramifications because it doesn’t involve them anyway. In other words: the “perfect” people.

The path to division becomes quite clear: despite the fact that both ideologies would naturally oppose such a thing, the pro-corporate and “perfect” influences within conservatism would undoubtedly encourage Republican leaders to champion this innovation and give conservatives an opportunity to champion personal responsibility, despite internal concerns about its compromising of a person’s liberty. Democrats would stand up, naturally siding with their governing ideology, and (shocker!) see themselves on the opposite side of the issue and (gladly) championing the rights of the people.

Of course, this probably won’t happen—and I could just as easily see the positions flipped on this same issue—but it serves as a hypothetical example of the wider, normally unexamined part of the political divide. Our governing ideologies are so very similar, but it is the local politics and affiliations that divide us.

What other issues should liberals and conservatives be ideological allies toward?

Remember the earmark crusade?

2011-05-16T14:09:00.001-04:00

I sure hope so, since it was only last fall. But the crusade to ban earmarks in Congress is incredibly relevant to our current political climate. Perhaps not as a matter of procedure, but as a matter of public policy in relation to governing ideology. Let me explain.

The anti-earmark crusade was based on three important principles. 1) fiscal appropriateness, 2) political games, and 3) clarity. Each of these principals was advanced as an important reason to end this political tradition.

fiscal appropriateness—Under the guise of cutting spending, Republicans have been arguing that earmarks are “pork” and “waste” that should be cut from the budget. This is more of an ideological principal than it is a pragmatic one. Earmarks made up less than 1% of the budget, so eliminating them makes little impact on the financial health of the government and rings of a “symbolic” measure. Lost in this argument, of course, is that earmarks aren’t always “waste” but the means of dictating where funds already budgeted will go. One might argue that without these specific instructions, waste is more likely to occur.
political games—For many, the idea that single Senators, such as Ben Nelson with the Affordable Care Act, could hold up legislation until they could be “bought” with enough “pork” became bipartisan outrage. Nobody likes this kind of gaming, and led to a great deal of outrage on both sides. That Republicans have been more likely to use earmarks in deals over legislation seems to be lost in the conversation. Also lost is that the best tool our Congresspersons have is to negotiate and compromise. So the political cover of compromise is thrown out in favor of a winner-take-all approach. Even though nobody likes the opportunist (what Sen. Nelson seemed to be), this decision actually minimizes everyone’s chance at walking away with a “win”. Look up game theory for a full understanding of how this is the case.
clarity—If it really isn’t about economics or political games, then it must be about clarity in government. Like the idea of despising the opportunist who tries to milk the system, people with all political proclivities hate this one last truth about this process: in many cases, earmarks have nothing to do with the bill in question. Actually, most do, and many more delineate how funds will be spent, but in some cases, the earmark is totally alien to the discussion. Most People want our representative democracy to battle over the actual matters, not slip bad ideas in the side door. If the fight is about a healthcare bill, then the fight should only pertain to that bill and its principle subject.

So when the new congress got to its first real battle: a budget resolution for 2011: they abandoned the principle behind banning earmarks (the clarity argument) in favor of political games and fights that don’t pertain to the budget (including the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) and Planned Parenthood). And as soon as a compromise was reached, the first statements out of the leadership involved what “deals” could be made over raising the debt limit and the 2012 budget. Instead of voting on the principal matter: the debt limit: Republicans hope to “get something out of the deal”. Isn’t this the very problem with earmarks? And if one is going to hold such a double-standard, shouldn’t they be held responsible for it?

It is not “politics as usual” when the governing ideology of one side refuses to fairly trust in compromise. It is a politics of cynicism and nihilism: two qualities needed least in our leaders.

Maybe I'm allergic to your intolerance...

2011-05-01T14:56:00.002-04:00

My daughter is allergic to peanuts.

I have to confess that the moment I found out, I was upset. Not for her, but for me. Her allergy would deprive me of one of my favorite foods: peanut butter. I got over that (mostly) and we try very hard to be careful for her sake.

One of her favorite books, which we read today is The Princess and the Peanut Allergy. It is the story of two best friends fighting over a birthday cake. The one with the birthday wants to have her favorite cake and her best friend there at the same time. The friend wants to be included, but knows she can’t because of her allergy. In the end, the birthday girl chooses her friend over peanuts. It is sweet and the kind of decision I want my daughter to make on behalf of other people.

Reading it today, brought another idea up. One more to do with my selfish wish for peanut butter than it does the generous spirit of the book. The context of allergies actually means life-and-death stuff: not some simple question about politics du jour. Because here is the bigger question: should we accommodate the other or should we imprison them in their homes? Is your right to carelessness and selfishness more important than my daughter’s right to live normally and safely?

We brush this off so easily, making the parents of children with allergies work incredibly hard at determining ingredients of food and providing a safe environment for our children. And most of us get really tired of being the ones advocating for our kids constantly and having to deprive them of church dinners or parties simply because they can’t eat what is being served.

Isn’t safety more important?

The Mars Co., makers of M&Ms, is a great big company and makes a whole lot of money. But now we can’t buy any M&Ms because they all bear the warning that they may contain peanuts. Mars is a big enough company to have regular M&Ms produced in a different space from the peanut and peanut butter ones. Easy solution. But instead, we are satisfied with a warning on the package and new responsibility for the parents: “No, Baby Girl, you can’t have M&Ms anymore. I know they’re your favorite.”

The applications for this callous understanding of freedom are endless:

the “need” to pass concealed handgun laws and then open-carry laws so that you have the right to make everyone around you afraid;
the "importance" of seeing fairness as only applying to academic-based scholarships, which deprive needy, inner-city youth from even going to college simply because rich kids got better grades;
allowing insurance companies to deprive coverage to anyone for any reason at all after taking their money;

and these are just the tip of the iceberg.

Some conservatives may try to spin this the other way or simply disregard me as the usual liberal calling for tolerance. So here’s the deal: it is about power. People without allergies are in a position of power and dominance over people with them. My daughter didn’t choose this. GOD isn’t punishing her because of our choices (remember, GOD promised David GOD wouldn’t do that). Like Superman, she has a weakness. So show some compassion! Don’t put peanuts in everything. It’s that simple. It is getting so easy to avoid the common allergens, that we no longer have the excuse not to accommodate them.

So quit complaining about your gun rights or your right to deprive others of healthcare or the rights of oil companies to rob you or the rights of drug companies to lie to you or use some example of some white person losing a promotion that was “theirs” to some “undeserving” minority. Just answer why is that more important than safety, health, and well-being?

Why is your individual right more important than the lives of thousands or millions of people?

slash and burn economics

2011-04-05T19:30:00.002-04:00

or
The problem with “the spending problem”

It really is quite the slogan. Catchy. Conservatives of all types have been trotting it out for the last year.

The trouble is that it is completely false.

I’ve written about the way we ought to look at our budget here, but I'll try another way.

The Simple View
The budget is composed of income and expense. The current conservative argument is to deal only with expenses and not touch income. This, of course, is ideologically-driven, based on the pre-existing desire to cut expenses.

However, since the recession, BOTH income and expenses have been effected. Half of the reason there is a significant deficit in the budget is do to a dramatic loss of revenue. To try to make up the difference while only dealing with expenses would be to cut twice as much. And the only way to do that is to decimate just about everything and cause further stagnation. Haven't businesses been complaining about unsettled conditions?

The Complex View
Where we all get mixed up is that our national income isn’t just taxes: it’s also investments and a variety of other income streams. This means, Wall Street. Democrats have been reluctant to punish the creators of the recession (Hint: they are named in the previous sentence), not because of campaign donations (since many more go to Republicans from there) but because Wall Street needs to perform to help raise the income. When Wall Street isn’t happy, as we saw last summer, they can stagnate the economic recovery all by themselves.

This is also where unemployment enters in. This goes well beyond the “more employment = more spending” equation. High levels of employment generate all sorts of revenue for the country. Anyone paying attention to the stimulus plan should understand this equation: every dollar spent on direct job-creating stimulus more than doubles the cash—you spend a dollar to create a new job, you actually create $2.17. If you spend a dollar to cut taxes, you walk away with less than $1.50. Dealing with unemployment is a fiscally responsible (and dare I say conservative?) approach to the economic crisis.

Fixing the budget “crisis”
The budget can actually be fixed by generating more income, not just cutting. Growth in jobs, particularly stable, public sector jobs and investments in innovative industries (you know, the kind that are growing and not shrinking) such as high-tech, renewable energy, and mass transportation (high-speed rail) create scores of money directly into the economy. They also bring growth to industries that will drive Wall Street, further growing the economy. I’ll even let them make a few cuts—take a look at the bloated defense budget...

If you want a better image for the conservative plan at the moment, think of slash and burn farming of the rain forest: it devastates the old-growth forests, it depletes the usefulness of the soil in just a couple of years, and increases smog and carbon dioxide. This level of destruction is unsustainable, and yields next-to-no benefit, while causing irrevocable harm to a fragile ecosystem. That’s the current conservative platform: massive destruction for low-yield gains. So here’s your bumper sticker.

Republicans: support the slash and burn economy.

9 long-term choices for liberals

2010-09-02T10:55:00.003-04:00

Going into the mid-term election, there are thousands of people trying to tell their party how best to approach the election. I am not one of those people. But I am someone who has a few ideas for the long-term conversation.

We always need to be thinking ahead. The rise of conservatism in the early 1980s and furthered in the 1990s was all due to diligent planning in the 1960s and 70’s. They came to the conclusion that they needed to make some choices and that they needed to make them together. Once those choices were made, everyone fell in line.

I’m not suggesting liberals adopt the conservative playbook. First, I don’t think most really want to, and second, we’d all be horrible at it. I am actually suggesting that they based their playbook on fundamental principles of change and that we can do the same. To do that, we have to make some choices of our own.

Before we begin, I use the term liberal intentionally. It’s not a bad word. If you prefer progressive, just insert it in yourself.

Reframed arguments
We begin by changing the way we argue about things and take the arguments out of conservative territory.

1. Responsibility
Conservatives don’t have the market cornered on responsibility, but they love to talk about personal responsibility and holding certain groups accountable. The problem with this view is that responsibility is targeted primarily at minorities, the youth, and teachers. At the same time, the same requirement is not expected of corporations, investors, business leaders, Congress, or upper-class families. Responsibility is discussed only in relationship to pregnancy, drug/alcohol use, credit use, and performance evaluations. It is rarely used to talk about taking responsibility for the environment, for our community, and for those that cannot take care of themselves. A move toward a broad platform of responsibility not only exposes the hypocrisy of Conservatism, it reveals the compassionate side of liberalism.

2. Budget Priorities
We have to admit that nobody likes taxes—but everybody loves investment. Nobody wants a handful of people determining what happens in our communities, but everybody loves flat roads and well-run infrastructure. Liberals can help reframe the notion of liberal budget priorities as being about sound, responsible investment with long-term benefits. It isn’t about the invisible hand, but the thousands of hands that make the roads on which you drive.

3. Simplicity
The moral Conservative shift was built on a doctrine of simplicity. If we don’t give kids condoms they won’t have sex. If we put drug users in jail, then there won’t be drugs. Regardless of their accuracy, they are effective as arguments because they involve an easy and intuitive leap. Liberals like evidence and complexity and accuracy. We can have all of those things. We just need to describe the complexity more simply. Kids have sex, so let’s keep them safe. Or our kids might have sex, so let’s help them make smart choices. Simple statements and honest to the position.

If you afford me a personal anecdote. I have this good friend from college. We were discussing abortion and taking opposing sides. After about 15 minutes of arguing, I had given him something like 10-15 arguments for keeping abortion legal. He gave me 2. And he thought he won. To “win,” he shifted the goalposts, rearticulated the same argument to look like a different one, and stood on definitive moral grounds. We don’t need to flood people with data, we just have to sound like we’re right.

The Law
Next, we move to the realm of law, courts, and legislation.

4. Interpretation
The problem with conservative court appointments of the last 30 years is not that the judges are conservative, but that many have an ideology that is inconsistent and ideologically repressive: something akin to a fundamentalist’s interpretation of Scripture. So let’s talk about the Constitution, about what we can reason, and what we can’t. Expose the problems with this interpretive strategy and say that we can’t stand for a narrow 1st Amendment for people, but a broad one for corporations; we can’t stand for statements about a literal interpretation of the Constitution, but then we legalize open-carry handguns (hint: no handguns in 1789). Let’s talk about the sensibility of judges and the importance of smart people on the bench with various opinions.

5. Sex
Moral conservatives claim to not want anyone to have sex outside of heterosexual marriage. Then they run around and have affairs, solicit young men in bathroom stalls, or otherwise sneak around and lie about their dalliances. In other words, the ideology is more important than the people. We know that this is bunk. Something like 98-99% of Americans that have had sex have done so at least once with contraception. And yet 60% of people are either Roman Catholics or Southern Baptist—two groups that oppose its use. Most people willfully ignore this teaching. And yet, moral conservatives feel compelled to advance it. The simple response is to continue to disregard it. Remind people that they are already using contraception. Remind people that it is the 21st Century and different modes of sexual expression are common place. But let’s take responsibility for the consequences of sex—before, during, and after the fact. If you oppose abortion, then put money into adoption services. If you oppose pre-marital sex, then give people something other than the Bible for why they shouldn’t be doing it right now. If you don’t want the government in your wallet, why do you want it in your bedroom?

6. Identity
This speaks to race, gender, ability, orientation, nationality, and is a catch-all for what it means to not be in the dominant group: relatively wealthy white people. Moral conservatives have used identity politics as a wedge issue and have matched with libertarian, meritocracy-types to keep the obstacles in place for minority and under-served groups. Instead of using heavy-handed moralism back, liberals could adopt a different strategy, taken from the new push in architecture: universal design. There is no reason to build a house or building that isn’t accessible to the physically disabled. To do so is to continue to ignore their presence among us. But, we can also see the sensibility of a door that anyone can go through, faucets and counters that anyone can use, etc. Teaching my two year-old to use the sink in my home required not just a step-stool, but a two-step stool. Thinking about the world in accessible terms is not anti-tradition—it’s simply smart and forward thinking.

Economics
The last piece is about money and the way we allow it to govern us.

7. Best Practices or Core Principles
For the last few decades, we have battled over political differences by highlighting our core principles. This is good. It now seems like its time to get back to best practices. I talked about simplicity in #3, and the arguments about sex and imprisonment are simplified arguments based on moral core principles of no pre-marital sex and the pursuit of high levels of incarceration. But wise people found the holes in both strategies: abstinence only education led to more pregnancies, not less; California’s three strikes law was catching people and locking them up for at least 10 years for, in one case, stealing a pack of gum. Both of these initiatives, intended to reduce the problem, actually expanded it, costing tax payers millions more per year to deal with the consequences. Let’s encourage logic and smart, best practices that both reduce the problem and encourage prudent fiscal priorities.

8. Main Street or Wall Street
Conversations about jobs seem to always turn to big corporations coming in and providing lots of jobs for a community. This has led to bidding between communities for who can wave the business taxes more. But the health of the American economy isn’t entirely dependent on corporations and the NYSE. In fact, we have allowed this charade to give corporations and stockholders enough power to hold our economy hostage. So let’s chuck it. We actually must choose to side with people. So, when in doubt, side with people. Worker safety complaints? Side with people. Consumer protection? Side with people. Workplace discrimination? Side with people. Environmental degradation? Side with people. Sometimes you have to side with people over siding with one person. Want to build a house on wetlands? Side with the people.

This will mean a rough road with many corporate interests and with groups like the Chamber of Commerce, but chuck it. Side with the people. We must take a consistent stand on the side of a strong, healthy, well-balanced population that has what it needs. Corporations are people? Unconstitutional.

9. Planning or Strategy
The last thing we have to do is adopt an ideology of long-range planning. Former Governor and DNC chair Howard Dean did that with his “50 State Strategy,” which was to invest money in every state, making more states more contestable, a big reason for Pres. Obama’s electoral victory. Liberals need to look beyond the next election and toward a long-term plan for liberalism (or progressivism if you prefer).

Instead of focusing our attention on each little move we have to make about each new issue that presents itself, we focus on the long-term plan. Taking the cost-prohibitive nature out of healthcare. Funding new initiatives for green technologies. Fighting for equality and the underserved. Seeking resolutions to international conflicts. Freeing up more time for families to spend together, enjoying the world around us. These are important goals and require more than a short-range election strategy. They require a plan. Kind of like this one.

Racism, Sexism, and Orthodoxy

2010-06-18T12:19:00.004-04:00

I recognize that this is an ambitious title, and this short post could not hope to measure up to it. At the same time, I hope to show you three things and will make a brief comment after it.

First, head over to Ephphatha Poetry here to read a great post called "Imagine if the Tea Party Was Black" (by Tim Wise).

Second, read this article for a new example of what is found in the first.

Third, check out this strange international event with regards to the Presiding Bishop and the Archbishop of Canterbury.

You might find the third reading to be a strange bedfellow with the first two: what does a seemingly small slight to an American bishop have to do with systemic racism, open bigotry, and a venomous political climate? Well, in short, everything.

Inherent to the problems the Tea Parties are obsessed with, Conservative public officials and pundits rail about, and those charging forward with denominational separation of churches preach about is a sense of orthodoxy that is insular and personal to these groups. It isn't simply that they demand their way or the highway, they demand control of the highway as a means of securing their way.

Of course, some is uglier than others. Violence and threats of violence is nothing like a man telling a woman, who is his peer, that she must act differently than the men that preceded her. And yet, there is something identical: the safety of distance in the office. +Rowan can have someone tell +Katherine that she needs to do something, and we go along--it seems so official. For her to comply is her taking the high road, and all of us that express outrage, well, we're just the cretins. Racist pundits and politicians are similarly isolated from this because of their office in the public square, and the virtue of getting the 'home-field advantage' (an important power-differential at the root of racism). And it is all thrown under the auspices of 'orthodoxy'--the traditional understanding of the world. It's too bad that what is exposed in all three of these articles is that what is being called orthodox is nothing of the sort--old bigotry wrapped in brand new acts parading as traditional understanding. The very idea that one does something new invalidates their very terms of the debate.

My plea is the same for those in Tea Parties as it is for the Archbishop: the practice you want others to follow ought to be the one you use. Making a bishop take off her mitre or taking an AK-47 to a rally is unprecedented and makes you the one breaking from orthodoxy. And if orthodoxy is your primary argument, then you'll probably lose the debate.

But being right was never really the intention, was it?

Reclaiming the Public Narrative: or why stupid things said for craven poltical game need to be called out for what they are

2010-02-09T09:13:00.004-05:00

Let’s pretend I’m a sports analyst on TV. If I made fun of Albert Pujols for using a baseball bat to crush a fastball, you would laugh at me—calling my argument patently absurd. If I made fun of Drew Brees for winning the Super Bowl by throwing a football, you would not only look at me funny, but my own cache would evaporate instantaneously. In either scenario, would I be considered fit for sports commentary? Should I expect to be taken seriously? Wouldn’t the obvious obliviousness be exposed and called out? Isn’t it proper for journalists to decry public statements that are patently absurd?

So why is it that the former sportscaster Sarah Palin’s persistent attacks on Pres. Barrack Obama’s use of a TelePrompTer aren’t treated to such similar condescension? The facts of the matter are obvious:

Virtually every televised public speech uses this device. So, in other words, it is used by everyone, in politics or not.
Every president has used it for years. This includes all of them. Did I mention that there are no exceptions?
Every candidate in recent memory has used it on the campaign trail—again, no exceptions, including every presidential and vice presidential candidate in 2008.
Every sportscaster or newscaster uses a TelePrompTer to report the news.

In the current climate, it is easy to make this conversation a personal one. It is easy to take this away from the BIG facts in favor of the small ones. In the above description, I didn’t say as candidates, Misters Obama, McCain, Biden, and Mrs. Palin each used a TelePrompTer. I didn’t call her a hypocrite (even though I will gladly do so now) for attacking Obama for doing something that she herself does and will do in the future. But the very facts of the matter is that it isn’t an either/or; it isn’t a he-does-this and she-does-that scenario. It is an everybody-does-this/how-can-there-be-an-issue sort-of-thing. Everybody uses a TelePrompTer because it is the logical tool for enhancing the effectiveness of speeches. It is a cynical person who seems to therefore be suggesting that if Mr. Obama speaks well and uses one than she should therefore speak poorly and not use one. That’s her argument…if it were really about logic.

I doubt that Mrs. Palin does this out of logic or out of a sincere attempt to change the way politics are done. It is an attempt to make fun of the President and impugn his character. Making fun of something so trivial is Gutter Politics 101—because its obviousness means that comment is often left unsaid. Defending Mr. Obama’s use of the device rightly seems defensive while attempts to point out Mrs. Palin’s similar use of the device can clearly be used to construct an “they’re out to get me” schema. There is no political solution to this callous political strategy, but there is a clearly necessary historic solution—to laugh at her. Just as we would laugh at a sportscaster for suggesting a baseball bat is a stupid tool for the game of baseball, shouldn’t we collectively laugh at the suggestion that a TelePrompTer is the wrong tool for giving a speech? Isn’t the suggestion plain enough that we can all see the inanity of it?

The Massachusetts Race

2010-01-19T10:14:00.003-05:00

Having only spent 9 months or so in Massachusetts, one would probably argue I shouldn't care who they elect. And in one way, I don't. If they today choose to elect a Republican, that's on them. If that breaks the 60-40 Democratic majority, it isn't the end of the world. What is actually the problem is who they would be electing. Take a look at Keith Olbermann's response from last night:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Unqualified, fringe candidates, when liberal, are often characterized as dangerous and when conservative, they are characterized as fresh. I get that. But isn't the "fresh" breed of conservative seem just a tad more dangerous? Shouldn't we do everything in our power to prevent just this kind of candidate from getting elected? People are that willing to compromise their political principles just to stick it to a local tone-deaf politician? Are we that petty and small? I guess we're about to find out...

Transformers 2: the Rise of the Moderates

2009-12-22T14:15:00.002-05:00

Let me see if I’ve got everything:

“Once-in-a-generation” healthcare bill is proposed to transform a failing healthcare system. Liberals shout with joy and conservatives shout with outrage. First draft of plan leaked in late spring shows concessions to conservative arguments before conservatives can argue against it. New draft comes out of finance committee chaired by Congressman Max Baucus to outrage by Left because it eliminates the biggest cost-saving principles (competition) and its instrument of fundraising may reduce the quality of care (tax on “Cadillac plans”) as well as by the Right on principle. The House cleans up this now weaker proposal, but soundly passes it with an eleventh hour draconian anti-abortion amendment by Rep. Bart Stupak (who I once voted for). Sarah Palin posts on her Facebook page that this bill transforms the country into the Soviet Union by creating imaginary “death panels” and rationing. August is spent watching confused Americans scream “take your government hands off my Medicare” and other nonsensical things. The Senate reconvenes and takes up the debate, starting with Majority Leader Harry Reid courting the two Republicans that they got to cross over last time as well as members of his own party that are apprehensive. They believe that something should be done, but not for another 5 years or so and not anything that would actually change anything or cost anything or actually do anything after all. Sen. Joe Lieberman says that he’s in favor of Medicare expansion, lowering the retirement age—a suggestion bouncing around Washington since Gov. Howard Dean’s proposal on the campaign trail in 2004. As Republicans continue to stonewall and talk about those imaginary “death panels” and communism and socialism and the state taking away your guns and wanting to kill grandma, the two Republicans signal that all of those bipartisan discussions were for nothing since they won’t break ranks. Sen. Lieberman now opposes Medicare expansion. Now Reid and Pres. Obama have a bill in which they are forced to compromise with their own party—or more specifically, the four holdouts in Nebraska, Louisiana, and Connecticut. The compromise brokered this weekend brought back the original complaints in the Baucus bill and seems even more compromised than Liberals feared and many are now talking about rejecting the current compromise bill.

Did I get it all?

There are several storylines in this mess that are worth noting, especially the basic political eventuality of many of the issues within it, but I’ll hold to this one thing: what the self-described moderates have managed to create is a bill that changes very little.

I’ve blogged before about the problems with moderates (including my first one on the myth of the political center, this one on the myth of the U.S. as "center-right," this one on the scandal of centrism, and this rant), but mostly that in their practical application as a subgroup (and not “liberal” or “conservative”, but as a third option) they have a truly and classically conservative impact on the discussion by minimizing the change to the status quo. Where conservatives act to maintain the status quo (or revert back to a previous status quo), the moderates serve to avoid significant alterations to the status quo in either direction. In many ways, this is a much deeper form of conservatism because it avoids transformative change, while conservatives are willing to transform the culture to better embody an idyllic past.

Chris Hayes of The Nation recently pointed out that the healthcare bill is not a transformation of a bad system into a better system, but the patching up of a bad system. I’ll bite at the obvious analogy. It’s like treating cancer with orange juice or a broken leg with a Band-aid: yes, it is helpful, but doesn’t combat the underlying problem. It’s the medical equivalent of treating the symptoms without attacking the presenting illness.

In some ways, the most masochistic part of the president’s demand for bipartisan support is that, in doing so, he gets no true transformation. To transform the system, the president would be better served reaching out to Conservatives, not Moderates, as they would be more willing to see dramatic change to the system. This may seem counterintuitive, especially in light of the two Republican Senators from Maine (Collins and Snow) who, in their willingness to even have a conversation, were treated as a revelation. Moderates, however, look to minimize the impact and drive unyieldingly after compromise, when better solutions may be negotiated without compromise—or perhaps come through compromise, not in compromise.

I’m not suggesting that the President miscalculated anything or that what the current bills offer isn’t significant change. They are. But it isn’t transformation. It isn’t a radical change in the behavior of Americans toward their healthcare system. Some of the symptoms will look better: fewer medical bankruptcies, expansion of care opportunities, and perhaps more standard expectations of care. But the presenting illness will remain unchanged: it protects the profit-making of insurance companies, corporate hospitals, and entrepreneurial physicians while limiting the recourse of those citizens seeking medical treatment, which means that today corporate CEOs get to decide whether Granny lives and dies (to use Sen. Chuck Grassley’s obsession with Grandmothers).

Perhaps before the story ends on healthcare reform, the leadership will be able to tell the difference between Re-Form and touching up.

It's the context, Stupid!

2009-11-18T08:57:00.000-05:00

NOTE: I originally published this on another blog, here.

There’s a reason people don’t trust journalists anymore.

OK, there are several, many of which have to do with political hacks arguing about bias, but there’s a more fundamental problem with journalists. The pursuit of objectivity creates subjectivity.

It’s easy for most of us to look at a situation and say “here’s how it happened…” and much like the game of telephone, how the story is told depends on who is telling it. This is how it works. The complexity in our brains means that no two people tell a story the same way without a script.

And there it is: the script. The common component. The one thing that can make my version of the story the same as your version. But what if the script is flawed?

This morning I listened to a story on NPR’s Morning Edition. A very trusted news source with trusted journalists that anchor the show. One of the stories that came out had to do with new figures that came out yesterday. Now, I don’t remember the precise wording, but this is the form they used to present the information:

“Medicare fraud more than doubled this year from 3.7% to 7.8%. Officials claim that the increase is due to new (more strict) accounting rules.”

The journalist argues that the news of the day is the higher percentage of reported fraud. The changed accounting rules is the rationale given by the officials, whose word must be seen in light of their potential bias. But there’s a gigantic hole in this argument: namely the context. The context for the news of the day is just as important as the news itself.

Context is important. If we think about it, the increased number, by itself is not news. Imagine this weather report:

“The Doppler projects 72 degrees. “

When? For how long? When won’t it be 72? Will it always be 72? And what about precipitation? In this way, the context for the fraud is the important part of the story. Now imagine this:

“The Doppler projects 72 degrees. The guy who reads it claims that the unseasonable warmth is due to weather coming from the south, off of the Gulf.”

Suddenly, the obvious conclusion about the nature of weather becomes someone’s claim or projection. Does this mean, that when the temperature only reaches 71, we’ll complain about ‘the guy who reads it’ and how completely wrong he was?

If we were honest, we’d adopt the story’s context as natural, just as we do with most anything else. Here’s what they could have said:

“Changes in accounting rules adopted earlier in the year have revealed a significant higher number of Medicare fraud cases from 3.7% to 7.8%.”

This statement adopted all of the information given in the previous statement, but places “today’s news” (the increase) in context with “yesterday’s” (the changed accounting rules). If we think more deeply about what was done in the first statement, a true event (the changed accounting rules) was placed within the contexts of an argument for why things changed. This not only calls into question the government’s defense for its new number, but it compromises the actual facts themselves. It suggests that “some people” think it has do with changed rules—and further implying that others might not. But did the rules actually change? Yes! Of course they did! Would they affect the number? Yes! They’re more strict! They are intended to actually find more cases of fraud. That the number grew means that the rules and the regulative body are actually doing their jobs! Today's news reveals that yesterday's news is succeeding at its intended purpose and what is revealed today must be taken as more accurate. This would then generate new thinking on fraud and the like.

So, despite the obvious context of the story that they could be writing, the journalists, in their effort to avoid subjectivity, present the news in a way that actually contradicts the nature of the event. By compromising the context of the story and projecting bias onto the regulatory agency, the journalist turns a story about more accurate numbers of Medicare fraud into a misrepresentative story about increased fraud. That this year’s number is larger does not demonstrate increased fraud when the measurements have changed, only that we should adjust our understanding of fraud to recognize a different percentage. Let’s go back to my weather analogy:

“The Doppler projects 72 degrees.” Was yesterday’s report.
“The Doppler projects 20 degrees.” Is today’s report.

Hmm. We might be tempted to wonder why these numbers are so drastically different. Our first inclination is to blame the Doppler itself. But along comes ‘the guy who reads it’ who explains that the Doppler was on Fahrenheit yesterday, but was switched to Celsius. In fact, ‘the guy’ actually told us yesterday that he was switching the numbers, but we didn’t think it would make very good news, so we buried it at the end of the report. So what does the journalist do?

“The Doppler projects 20 degrees. This is a 52 degree drop-off from yesterday. The guy who reads it claims that he switched the analysis from Fahrenheit to Celsius.”

Of course this scenario is absurd, but no less absurd than the notion that we can talk about today’s events without talking about its context, let alone an accurate accounting of yesterday’s events. Because the rules changes themselves are less sexy, we don’t actually process them as happening. We don't adjust the reality then, when we should. This means that when the results of the change differ from our pre-existing expectations, we’re perplexed and turn into inconsolable weepers.

There is an obvious connection to our churches and their existing expectations. For many, our evaluation tools haven’t changed from the 1950s or ‘60s. This provides for inaccurate assessments of the current base of Christians as well as potential members. For some, the switch over from membership to Average Sunday Attendance (ASA) was seen in just the same light as these changed accounting methods. The numbers are compromised because we attack the messenger or we see it as the work of “those higher-ups in New York”. When we do that, we don’t take all of the conversation in context, and we fail to recognize the truth of the situation.

But I think this speaks more broadly to the way we interact with the world. We actually do have a subjective view of the world: we’re optimists that believe in Jesus’ coming to save the world, and in our part in building up the Kingdom of God here on earth. We aren’t called to be objective about this.

But we’re also called to better understand the Scripture and God’s call for us. We shouldn’t get ourselves into the he-said/she-said style of journalism. If we did, we might find ourselves presenting the gospel from last week this way.

“Jesus left the Temple with his disciples. The Jewish Rabbi claimed that the Temple would be destroyed. Critics of the Rabbi and his followers protested this evaluation, suggesting that…”

I can’t imagine any of us wants to see The Story reduced in that way.

Huckabee politicizes Kennedy

2009-08-31T12:15:00.001-04:00

Now, this is just sick.

"Hi, Kettle, have we met?"

The West Wing, leadership, and how easy it is to offend the Right

2009-08-11T11:31:00.001-04:00

I've been watching The West Wing again. We got rid of cable, so my wife and I now spend that time watching TV on DVD. It actually seems pretty silly.

Perhaps the most amazing thing to me about the show is that it seems to be a show about leadership. We get to see how people act when times are good and bad. We get to learn about repercussions and expectations. And more to the point, the show was perpetually timely. Watching the first season, you just know that it is 1999-2000. You can feel it in your bones. The issues they are discussing, the popular wisdoms, and even the way the parties respond represents that time period. It is a wonderful time capsule.

As I watch through the seasons, I also watch/listen to the commentaries. I like to know what goes into the making of the show, where the writer and director are coming from, and getting to know some of the actors' personalities when they aren't in character. One thing that keeps popping up from Aaron Sorkin and Thomas Schlamme is that they received heavy criticism about the show's "politics". They discuss it a bit, but cast it off. I, however, want to challenge this--even if it is a few years past.

I just watched the episode "The Two Bartlets" from the third season. The two primary issues in the episode are about friendship and affirmative action. In fact, the only thing that was of particular interest in terms of "issue politics" was the debate over affirmative action that was had between C.J. and Toby (two democrats) who take very different positions. In fact, Toby refrains from tearing down C.J.'s arguments (con), even though I, a viewer, could. The show, in fact, proclaims two positions and refrains from saying either one is better. I can't see what the problem is here.

They also have a secondary issue in which Josh is asked to take advantage of a friendship he has with someone to solve a national defense issue (long story). Josh does make an impassioned plea on the part of his friend, the demonstrator, and bringing up his stance (which seemed pretty solid from where I sit). Again, what is not at stake was a clear policy position taken by the people running the show, because Josh is still being forced to convince his friend to stop protesting. This not only avoids a rendering on the issue, but says something instead about the workings and priorities of governments, which is often in action, not argument.

But the crux of the episode is not the issues in and of themselves, but a discussion about the people that are given the authority to deal with them. In the case of the show, that is the White House staff and the elected officials that lead them. In the climax of the episode, Toby takes his concern for the president not taking a stand on the affirmative action debate into the Oval Office. He wants the president to take a stand. He also raises the question of why he didn't take a stand: Pres. Bartlet doesn't want to be smart.

Viewers of The West Wing know that Pres. Bartlet is brilliant. He has a PhD in Economics and is a broadly-read and classically-trained scholar. He is smart. Toby suggests that there are two Bartlets: the nutty and jovial professor and the impassioned and determined reformer. What Toby is getting at is that the President tries to be the nutty professor because, of all things, he was smarter than his father, and it cost him love. The implications of this are that he only expects to get love when he avoids looking smart.

What is both timely (2002) and timeless about this episode was that we were in the midst of 'frat-boy' politics. We had a president in real life that many would have preferred to have a beer with than the other guy. We didn't like people looking smart. Just like my best friend in grade school that hid his report card because he didn't want people to know he got all A's. Just like I am told that I occasionally preach over the heads of people. I won't call it an anti-intellectual agenda, but something worse. This is the politics.

In the show, the "plain-spoken" everyman Republican candidate wins the Iowa primary, setting him up to be the one true challenger to the president in season 4's election. What this represented was Karl Rove (as a disciple of the Barry Goldwater school of politics) and his strategy to challenge an opponent's greatest strength, thereby weakening the whole candidate. In this case (like what happened in 2000 and would get replayed in 2004), the candidate not only runs a campaign that suggests that an 'average joe' has worthy skills, but that it is preferable to intelligence.

This strategy only works if the intelligent one is reluctant to show his intelligence. I'll overlook the fact that many Americans prefer smart people in the White House, to take this argument: what is Pres. Bartlet if you take intelligence out of the equation? What happens to his identity? What is even left? The very notion that this president would shy away from an intellectual challenge demonstrates truly poor leadership on his part.

The reality of the show in general was that the politics were very fair, even when they didn't need to be. The president himself demonstrated a hawkish foreign policy and a neo-liberal economic policy, both of which should clearly appeal to conservative and pro-corporate sympathies. And the one area that he was most liberal were on social issues, which always took a back seat when the times got tough. In fact, the Left-Wing was thoroughly abused in much of the show's run. While fairly representing the Democratic Party of the 1990s and 2000s, it also seems to be a less problematic position for conservatives, I would assume, as it matches or complements their positions on issues than a platform more Rooseveltian or Johnsonian. Instead, the real problem many conservatives had with the show was simply that it was told from a Democratic administration's perspective and the viewer was asked to root for Democrats. The horror.

For me, I still look at the examples of leadership. You stand up and shout whenever the President or staff take a stand. The times you feel good about them are when they say what they believe. There is a reason the first season's "Let Bartlet Be Bartlet" is one of the show's best episodes: it's about taking a stand.

Why I don't care about the Insurance Lobby

2009-07-29T11:05:00.003-04:00

Here's just a quick thought.

Over the last decade we have seen a mass exodus of American manufacturing overseas. As of 2007, New Balance, the last holdout of a company producing shoes in the U.S., was manufacturing in China. They have since re-established some of their manufacturing in the U.S. But that is only one shoe company.

Also, check the labels on your shirts, pens, coffee mugs, and anything else you touch on a daily basis. Not much "made in the USA".

We allowed the manufacturing sector to shed tens of millions of jobs and General Motors and Chrysler to file for bankruptcy (after shedding tens of millions of jobs since the 1960s themselves). We watch our IT and customer service work shipped to India. In fact, as we learned last fall, we placed the entire health of our economy on those beacons of altruistic thinking: Wall Street, Bankers, and Real Estate.

Like the decision of the Big Three to focus on high-margin luxury SUVs while abandoning the small car and alternative-energy industries, our entire economy has been turned away from providing for the small needs of the many and toward the big wants of the few. If you don't believe me, call a lobbyist.

So here's my quick thought: why do we care what health insurance companies have to say? They don't provide the care or seek it. They don't provide the new technologies that provide better access to life-saving methods. They aren't working on new drugs that are revolutionizing patient care. They take money from people in hopes that they never have to spend it. Is this an industry that is essential to the livelihood of this nation? Why should we preserve their existence? Why should we ignore the displacement of millions of Americans from their stable jobs, but suddenly care about the insurance industry? Why should we place the future of the medicine on the bottom-line of Blue Cross and Met Life?

Isn't there a place for my right to quality care? Shouldn't we have a medical system that actually puts saving lives before saving the jobs of the insurance lobby? Shouldn't people be encouraged to go to the doctor and not worry about whether or not their crappy insurance will cover the visit, or worse, what is found when they get there? How many have walked into a doctor's office and prayed that nothing is wrong, not because they want to stay healthy, but because they can't afford for something to be wrong? I for one have. Isn't that more important than the insurance industry?

You can scream and rant about free markets till the cows come home but the statistics are staggeringly against the status quo on this one. If we actually crafted a HEALTH-care system, none of us would need to worry about finding new jobs for all of those insurance agents--they could get jobs helping facilitate care.

Defense briefings manipulated Pres. Bush

2009-05-19T09:05:00.005-04:00

Leading off last night's Countdown, Keith Olbermann reveals that former Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld made cover pages for his presidential briefings that combined scripture with pictures of military personnel in Iraq. The full story can be viewed here:

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The pages revealed such pairings as:

"Whom shall I send, and who will go for us."
A picture of soldiers praying--the day before the invasion.

"It is God's will that by doing good you should silence the ignorant talk of foolish men." -1 Peter 2:13
A picture of Saddam Hussein.

"Open the gates that the righteous nation may enter, The nation that keeps faith." --Isaiah 26:2
A picture of the crossed swords, the entrance to the ceremonial parade route.

These cover pages are pretty sick.

Olbermann's discussion and conversation with Richard Wolffe were quite good and covered the purpose and repercussions of their use. But there is one thing that they failed to mention. In their attempt to describe how brazen and manipulative this was on the part of Rumsfeld, they missed one specific opportunity: Bush is famous for not reading what's handed to him.

Rumsfeld isn't simply using Biblical quotes to manipulate a devoutely religious president, but giving a visual "summary" for a leader that wouldn't read the interior pages.

The pages themselves are constructed in a highly visual manner. They contain a photograph taken on the previous day, and a quote from the Bible that is made relavent to the photograph to tell a story of righteousness on the part of the United States. This is, in itself, a disturbing thing. But paired with Bush's tendency to rely on the good intentions of his subbordinates, reveals an incredibly dangerous opportunity for manipulation and deceit.

As governor, Bush famously suggested that he could decide death penalty cases in 15 minutes (despite dozens of pages of documents per case), and then part-way through the term, he reduced the time to 10 minutes. When setting foot in the Oval Office, Bush changed the protocol to include single-page summaries so that he would not be responsible for reading the entire document. Conscious of this tendency on the part of the then-president, Rumsfeld was able to color the summary he was giving the president to fit the schema that they had developed: The United States is acting righteously, boldly, and with God's support in its attempt to bring down the forces of evil.

What we do with this evidence, I don't really know. It does continue to reinforce our fears that their was a shadow-government in the White House, run by the Vice President and assisted by the Secretary of Defense to convince the president to start a phony war. Or it could be a disturbingly crass misuse of Scripture. But does it really matter? The damage is still done.

More on the fallacy of "the moderate"

2009-03-30T09:37:00.006-04:00

In the U.S., we have an infantile view of political ideology. Perhaps it is born out of a two-party system (more vibrant democracies have more than two parties--we're actually the only highly industrialized nation that has only two parties of consequence) and its inherent bifurcating of issues into yes/no or good/bad or mine/yours. It is a truly immature form of governing.

Note: I say immature, which is ironic, since young voters are most likely to vote for third party candidates, thereby exercising their belief in a more vibrant democracy. Our older (and ostensibly more mature) voters become increasingly less likely to do so. Perhaps this should help us reorient our understanding of maturity?

At the same time, instead of operating in a non-dualistic system, we create a false paradigm of linear relationship. Such as can be seen in this diagram:

At the one end is liberalism and at the other is conservatism--as if there is no way in which they can have matching ideologies--implying that they are, indeed, polar opposites--and in the place of unity must certainly be in the mythical midpoint: moderatism.

I bring this up because of the new 'working group' forming in the Democratic Party, led by Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana. A long-time Clinton associate and supporter of Sen. Clinton's campaign until he switched to then Sen. Obama. Bayh, given speaking time at the Democratic Convention, given access to the president, has now decided to make himself a kingmaker.

Bayh's op-ed in the Washington Post argues against this, while actually demonstrating that he is intending to do just that. His prime argument is this:

The stakes are too high for Democrats to fear a policy debate. Such debates produce better legislation. On nearly all important votes, a supermajority of 60 senators will be needed to pass legislation. Without Democratic moderates working to find common ground with reasonable Republicans, the president's agenda could well be filibustered into oblivion.

What is interesting is that he didn't suggest such a thing under the previous president, a time in which (arguably), his ideology was most needed and concensus building were most important. Instead, he stood on the sidelines. At the same time, he is making a bold, and fundamentally flawed (in the Shakespearean sense) argument if he actually believes that "moderates working to find common ground with reasonable Republicans" is an appropriate task for him and his group, "praised" by the White House and Senate Leadership. Friedmann would remind us to stay away from triangulation and attempts to intercede on behalf of someone else. I would say, Who gives you the right to decide policy for the entire Democratic Party? How can this be seen as anything but a power play? If he were truly post-partisan, he would be using many more carrots than sticks in this conversation.

He then makes the foolish argument that the country is "moderate". And conservative. Just not liberal. Moderate with more conservativism than liberalism. Or something.

What Bayh seems to be doing is to actually create a new party within the Democratic Party. Perhaps we should look at a different graph:
In this graph, you can see that the horizontal access demonstrates the spectrum of liberalism to conservatism. The vertical access shows the differing parties.

Bayh's idea is that Democrats have to allign themselves appropriately with the ideologically similar groups: liberal Democrats with conservative Democrats and that conservative Democrats are most like liberal (or his word: reasonable) Republicans, so they should hash out some compromises on the part of the party.

But look at the graph as I've composed it. Since we have already thrown out the previous understanding, Bayh's rationale doesn't seem to make sense. If you are a "left-leaning" Republican, why should we assume that the point of contact is with a "right-leaning" Democrat? What makes us so sure that they have more in common than the liberal Democrats? Isn't it possible that the so-called moderates (or liberal Republicans) are socially liberal and fiscally conservative and that conservative Democrats might be socially conservative and fiscally liberal?

Ah! But there's Bayh's argument! We're fiscally conservative like they are! Remind me again why we should have you speaking for the entire party?

We plan to be a positive force in our caucus, exemplified by the constructive role a number of us played in making reasonable adjustments to garner the GOP votes needed to pass the president's economic recovery package.

A package that ended with less money than both sides started with ($900 billion vs. $820 billion finished at $780 billion).

In 1993, the three of us, as much younger politicians, stood with great expectations as the last Democratic president was sworn in with big plans, a head of steam and a Democratic Congress ready to begin a new progressive era. In less than two years, it all came crashing down, with disillusioned moderate voters handing the GOP broad congressional victories in 1994.

Yes, but again, was it a lack of moderates in the Democratic Party and in the senate, running their own operation, and cutting their own deals? Shouldn't we suggest that Bill Clinton, a southern Democrat and neoliberal, is much different than Barack Obama, a midwestern Democrat and traditional liberal? Doesn't the Clinton agenda have more to say in its own failure (and impact on the Senate) than the Senate had in impacting the Clinton years? And don't we have something to learn from a 1976 election in which a conservative president (Carter) was compromised in the Senate by a liberal Democratic leader (Ted Kennedy)?

And if our problem is the confrontational mode of liberal/conservative (and the ensuing need to be moderate), how is the creation of a shadow, deal-making group of Senators going to bring about a different paradigm? Back in 2007, I made this post about the fallacy of "the moderate". What it means for us is that the operating principle of the moderate is to radically eliminate conflict, working at odds with some competing agendas while reinforcing other ones. In the other post, I use the example of Supreme Court confirmations and the filibuster rule. The moderates give away the confirmations to preserve the filibuster. In this way, the fundamental argument (confirmations) is given a lower priority than the side argument (filibuster rule). Compromise between moderates then cannot be seen as a reliable means of doing business, as the primary function of the compromise was to deal directly with the confirmations--not the filibuster. Secondly, its interest in preserving the law and minimizing perceptual damage is actually the classic definition of conservatism. Conservatives make bad compromisers since they are ideologically opposed to disrupting the status quo.

Now look again at the second graph. Why would we want conservative Democrats to speak for the President of the United States?

Also, look at Rachel Maddow's take. It is perfect.

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"They're both doing it"

2009-03-18T11:41:00.007-04:00

Let me start by saying this: I hate this statement. It is a pernicious and deceptive non-argument that operates with something I might call "fudged facts".

Fudged Fact - to misrepresent an otherwise accurate assessment by messing with its context.

Let me describe the issue and its problems.

You have no doubt been in the middle of a conversation/debate with someone when the other person suddenly makes the claim that "they're both doing it." The phrase, at its base, is used to suggest that two opposing parties are both guilty of the same problem. It is also most commonly used to refer to politicians in the Republican and Democratic Parties specifically.

The phrase is also commonly uttered on TV yakfests, such as The View or cable news shows. Some talking heads (pundits) employ it during real news broadcasts, and even some self-described Moderate politicians will use it to condemn both parties. I have complete faith that you've heard the phrase at some point--if not ad nauseam.

But here is why I consider it pernicious:

It implies equality. The suggestion of the phrase is that since two opposing parties are doing something, then they are of equal guilt. This does not take into account the possibility that one may be far more likely to do it or has already participated in it to a far greater extent.
It is an act of misdirection. It redirects the conversation away from what is currently being discussed. It is often the associations or experiences that are the center of the problem, but in misdirecting our focus, our attention is turned toward this presumed equality.
It actually cuts off debate. It eliminates the very center of the argument and pulls us to the lowest common denominator. If two parties receive money from an energy company, but only one seems to re-write regulation to curry favor with the company, the act of bringing up the perceived equality in receiving funds keeps us from debating the actual problem, which is the legislation that produces the favor.
It is an act of derision. It makes the claim that because persons A and B have this same association, they are both bad. This (again) brings up the lowest common denominator: A is actually perceived as less of a pariah if A and B are both pariahs!

The last implication brings up the prospect of 'taint'. This is a variation of poisoning the well. It brings equality among the unequal. Like the old stereotype that "one drop" of African American blood makes you African American (and therefore not white), the suggestion is that it doesn't matter how bad you are; if you have done something bad, then you are bad. Bernie Maddoff is equal to a shoplifter.

This may also imply that all crimes are equally bad--which could be the real reason why we can't seem to punish the Bush White House or Wall Street--we know better. We know that these crimes aren't equal.

When we paint with the same broad brush, we miss the actual differences--just as when we focus on the differences, we actually ignore the similarities. But in the case of the non-argument "They're both doing it," we are laying equal guilt and directing the conversation elsewhere, when the central concern must be what the one is doing. Let's use the above example:
Throughout the 1990s, one energy company (Enron) gave millions in campaign contributions to Republicans and Democrats. The ratio was something like 5-to-1 or 10-to-1 (favoring Republicans). They helped rewrite legislation in Texas under a Republican governor (who himself received many millions in contributions), reciprocating deals for the company, and even getting them exclusive access when he became President of the United States. The same company used the energy crisis in California to force its governor (a Democrat) to sign a reprehensible contract to save his state. Enron held millions of people hostage through a shady, quasi-legal contract. Further, under the Texan, the Enron contract was upheld and not investigated, even though there was clear evidence of extortion. In the late 1990s, legislation was passed by a Republican-controlled congress (and they overrode Clinton's veto) that allowed a company like Arthur Anderson to both audit and advise a company like Enron. These rules allowed Enron to exploit the consumers, make a killing on Wall Street, and make a fortune off of the backs of people that would later to the brunt of the abuse when Enron collapsed. So here's the checklist:

Enron greatly favors Republican candidates
Republicans grant access to Enron
Republicans re-write laws allowing Enron (and Arthur Anderson) to cheat
A Democrat is extorted and a state is held hostage
Enron's collapse generates millions for the board and CEOs
Investors lose everything.

The result: anytime this was brought up in the 2000, '02, and '04 elections, it was received with that great misdirection: but you just pointed out that "they're both doing it"! Yeah. Sure.

Don't frighten the economy!

2009-02-23T16:59:00.001-05:00

If we are to believe the current knocks on Pres. Obama, it is that he dares to talk responsibly about the economy. Rachel Maddow called it "talking like a grownup." If he keeps talking about the current mess with such (gasp!) honesty, then he might frighten it into a recession. So we should he needs to sweet talk it. He should have sent flowers and chocolates to it for Valentine's Day. Maybe take it out for a dinner and a movie once in a while. Poor neglected economy!

Even former Pres. Clinton got in the act. Stupid Bill. Don't you know that you're not supposed to be talking right now?

Not only is this line of reason pretty laughable, the truth of what they are saying seems to be lost on them. The fact that Wall Street (you know--legalized corporate gambling) runs on fear--that it rises and falls based on people's irrational responses to good and bad news--has been a recurring theme since the first stock market dip in 2001 and 2002. That fear-based selling and pack mentalities tend to cripple our economy when more stable-minded investing encourages long-term growth is well known, but seemingly unpracticed on Wall Street. Extending this idea to broader economic conditions seems logical.

Except for one thing: the president isn't the one doing the selling. He isn't even the one feeding information to stock-holders or CEOs. They are the ones acting immaturely and without regard to our economic future. You don't blame the victim of a crime for the perpetration of the crime any more than you blame the official that points out that a crime has taken place!

This is the "more of the same" has to change. This is the behavior that needs an overhaul.

The public (unsolicited and inappropriately open) "suggestion" that Clinton gave Obama was to express more confidence. A commentator compared this with FDR's "nothing to fear but fear itself", but they are missing the forest for the trees. The nature of addressing fear is not calling the president a cheerleader-in-chief, but the actual standing up to the fear. Confidence is great, but if it isn't used to stand up against the fear, it is misused.

I can't help but think of all of the abuse perpetrated on others because we don't want to rock the boat or make hay over things. Allowing criminals to go unpunished and victims to go without justice. It sanctions violence: physical, political, economic, psychological, and karmic. The only sollution to this kind of violence is to clear the air. This requires honesty and openness.

Perhaps its time the people entrusted with our economy, who demand an unregulated market, actually acted as if they could be trusted to spend five dollars on anything but candy.

Prosecuting Torture, Part 3

2009-02-02T11:06:00.005-05:00

Our rule of law is based on two spheres of influence: personal and public. We are free to do as we please in our personal sphere as long as it stays in the personal sphere and doesn't impinge on my freedom over here in my sphere (the public sphere being the space between our personal spheres). The famous interpretation of liberty comes to mind: your right to swing your fist ends at its contact with my nose.

It seems, therefore, that the rule of law is based on the interactions of people. Our primary laws are about violence enacted by Person A against Person B. Violence can be defined broadly: such as murder and intent to murder, rape, fistfights, and sexual assault, for starters. It also implies the psychic violence of oppression, theft, torment, kidnapping, and so on. In most criminal activity there is a transgressor and a victim of some form of violence.

We also have laws with less widespread support, and more vocal opposition, because the primary 'victim' of the crime is actually the perpetrator. Most common examples of this are drinking laws, possession and use of drugs, and some traffic violations (seat belt and helmet laws). In each of these cases, the primary execution of the law is based on the individual (and his/her rights within his/her own sphere of influence), while they each possess a secondary public sphere component--underage drinking may lead to drunk driving which may lead to harming others and/or property; accidents in which drivers are not wearing seat belts put a greater strain on the medical system; etc..

In this case, our understanding of criminal activity is inseparably related to violence of one to another. This has also extended to groups of people--both separately and corporately--as well as corporations being arraigned for their collective violence against other people. Each of these is consistent with our rule of law.

So here's the kicker: it really doesn't matter how we define torture, because the world's definition holds greater sway.

As I've spoken before, first on the inconsistency of the opposition to prosecution here and then in the political ramifications of prosecuting torture here, it is clear that something has to be done. What I am doing here is dealing with the very nature of crime (as opposed to the nature of prosecution, or giving reasons for why the Bush Administration has actually committed a crime: both of these have been well described elsewhere) and the nature of relationship.

And back to my supposition. As crime is about relationship and the disabling of relationship through violence, there are times when the "facts" are compromised by the perpetrators. For us, that means the U.S. government, the President of the United States, the greater U.S. military and its officers, the C.I.A. and N.S.A., and even Congress are compromised in their ability to deal with the crime of torture as perpetrated by agents of the United States. This makes the prosecution no less necessary on the part of the Attorney General, and I still strongly encourage this to happen. At the same time, the very nature of the crime of torture is that there are several acts of violence that are actionable: the individual acts of torture are each subject to prosecution (numbering in the thousands) and those military and intelligence officials that perpetrated those acts are subject to prosecution. Next are the officers that either condoned the action or ignored the action; for the officers, either case is prosecutable. What is most likely, however, is that they will be targeted for a third option: promotion of these actions. Of course, this is likely to go up the chain of command until it reaches the former Vice President and President, who not only admitted to knowing about torture, but admitted to endorsing its use. All of this is actionable on the part of prosecutors.

The amazing thing, however, is that, just as a crime can be both a violation of state and federal law, a crime can be a violation of federal and international law. This means that the legal protections written by John Yoo and interpreted by the Bush Attorneys General are entirely irrelevant. It may be possible for the courts, or even the Supreme Court, to come up in support of Bush's torture policy (though obviously unlikely) and still be tried and convicted in the international court.

This is what I find so strange about this line of argument on the part of the Bush Administration, which suggested, as former President Nixon suggested: if the president does it, it isn't illegal: and yet it is. It is illegal. Truly and sincerely so. If you get a bunch of people in a room, hold up an apple and shout at the top of your lungs: this is not an apple!: who is going to suggest that the piece of fruit stopped being an apple? You might convince a couple of idiots that it is something else, especially if you give it a fancy new name like "juicy fruit plucked from a tree" and refuse to honor its apple identity. You might get a couple more people to start using the new name Juicy Fruit Plucked From a Tree in place of apple because they fear the suggestion that they are operating from a position of bias; and yet it is still an apple!

Don't mistake this existential example as refuting postmodernism--because its understanding as apple is not dependent on those within the system, but in the entire system. In other words, it doesn't matter how the Bush Administration and its apologists defined torture, the definition of torture by the broad community and its institutions still set that definition. For as long as there is Amnesty International or legal institutions like the International Criminal Court, the definition of torture will be broad. Just because news agencies put quotes around the word torture or parrot the phrase "enhanced interegation" doesn't mean it isn't torture.

The apple's identity is dependent not on the individual that stops calling it an apple, but on the wider community that still knows and refers to such a fruit as apple.

Erroneous pundits

2009-01-21T14:57:00.002-05:00

This was a nice find. The blogger gives a full accounting of how wrong pundits were a year ago about President Barack Obama. Plus, look at who got it right and who got it completely wrong--worth a strange thought.

The Speech

2009-01-21T10:53:00.002-05:00

It's interesting, really, to listen to the talking heads blather on about things. Its a lot like a blog--only on television and without the chance of reflection or proper consideration due the subject matter.

If you saw the inaugural speech yesterday, you no doubt recognized something different. Unlike his predecessors, President Barack Obama didn't outline the next 100 days. He didn't flatter us with praise about how great we are. He didn't pretend that his campaign promises are no longer relevant since he won the election. No, Obama's speech was clever, subtle, demanding, challenging, eloquent, and showed a deft touch with the English language hinted at throughout the campaign. It wasn't just a homerun, but a ninth inning grand slam.

But those talking heads sure felt blase about the speech. I heard one say that Obama chose to speak "in prose" when he should have been speaking "in poetry". They were disappointed. They expected more. It seems appropriate to point out that the early returns on Bush's first inaugural were "he's greatly improved". Hmmm...

Here we are. One of the historians on Jim Leherer News Hour did suggest that the gravity of the day may have led people to expect too much--something adroitly suggested in advance on The Daily Show Monday night.

Or it could be that we aren't use to responsibility--true responsibility. The responsibilities encouraged of us over the recent decades have not only been personal, but were ones deffered by the government. Consumer protection, healthcare, financial planning for retirement--you know, the kinds of things that rich people hire other people to worry about (itself seen as a personal responsibility). Mr. Obama called on individual responsibility to respond to the crises before us. To make ourselves involved in the system and be involved in the way our government operates. To be full and active citizens in our own country. To reach for higher ideals than we have ever been challenged to do.

And this is the real issue. The part that threw all of the pundits and talking heads off. The real part of the thing, which is the part they still don't get about Mr. Obama. The speech was a simultaneously a clear divorce from recent history and an embrace of our historic traditions. His speech evoked references to Washington, Lincoln, and Kennedy (not Bush, Clinton, Bush, or Reagan) while saying the needs of today do not match the leadership we have had. In this way, the speech isn't just a stick in the eye of the Bush Administration (which it clearly was), but a stick in the eye of those Washington insiders that have grown fat off of the culture wars and politics of the Reagan and post-Reagan eras.

Even more than this, we are condemned. It isn't just Bush and Cheney; Clinton, Bush I, Reagan. It is us. We have been misguided and wrong. We have failed to make the hard decisions ourselves. We have kicked the can down the street. This is the real reason talking heads didn't like the speech. They don't want absolution for their sins, they don't want their sins exposed!

The true genius of Mr. Obama's speech is the way in which he covered each of these elements. Yes, we are at fault. Yes, truth hurts. But the light of day can clean us. And working together, as we have in the past, can absolve us. In Obama's America, there is no your and my problems; only our problems. In Obama's America, we can solve those problems together. Has a speech ever been more relevant than that?

President Obama

2009-01-20T15:09:00.002-05:00

It is now official!

We have a new president!

Happy Inaugration Day!

2009-01-20T11:30:00.003-05:00

Here is my first chance to wish everybody a Happy Inauguration Day!

Get the champagne ready and give out a big ol' 'Whoot!'

Prosecuting Torture, Part 2

2009-01-20T11:16:00.004-05:00

On last night's Countdown, Keith Olbermann produced the following 'Special Comment' urging soon-to-be president Barack Obama to prosecute former Pres. George Bush, former Vice Pres. Dick Cheney, and administration officials for war crimes.

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Olbermann gives a concise argument for the prosecution, but he also gives a great deal of attention to the gestures that Obama has made toward not prosecuting. Most important, however, is his final argument, which I will summarize this way: many of our biggest disgraces as Americans and as people have been the times in which we sought an earlier compromise in place of dealing directly with the political consequences.

This in no way suggests that there isn't a great deal of hardship with our current climate. Especially considering the heightened divisiveness fostered by and festering since the mid-90's. However, the lack of action will most certainly serve as presidence and opportunity in the future for domestic malfesance. And worse, it will endanger the very DNA of our country, staining the Constitution and endangering the democratic nature of our republic. Nothing will prove the unitary executive like the not holding of its proponents accountable for their crimes.

Is this who we really are? Is this who our children and grandchildren want to be?

Prosecuting Torture

2009-01-19T18:01:00.003-05:00

Or why 24 is still part of the same scam.

It is well-documented that Fox’s hit for the last seven years, 24, is a persistent supporter of torture. We are familiar with the case: Jack Bauer tortures bad guys, gets important information, saves the world. We are also (almost) willing to admit that Jack Bauer has been Bush’s best ideological recruitment tool for the support of torture. The impact of the show is truly staggering as the television depictions of torture, which were virtually nonexistent before 24 aired, have grown to incredible volumes, with over 80 such depictions in a single year on networks in 2006. We have also heard that the biggest problem facing military instructors is that new recruits often site Jack Bauer as not only an influence, but as a defense for their opposition to the military code of conduct.

We all know this. But the new season of 24 has altered its pro-torture stance subtly; perhaps subtle enough to persuade the unsuspecting.

Before I go any further, I must disclose that I don’t watch 24. I did watch the first season on DVD, found it incredibly riveting, and always planned to watch the second. Reports of the content, however, have calmed my interest. My depiction of the first four episodes of the current season are based on a radio report of the show, which included audio clips of the content.

In the new season, Jack is in legal trouble for his actions (you know, the torturing). His defense is, essentially, yes I did it, but these are tough times. In tough times, you have to be willing to do the unpopular thing. Before I go any further, you are likely to say that this message is no different than the message we heard in support of torture in 2004 when public news broke about it. But look at the message in its new context—being prosecuted for torture. In 2004, we were still in the get-the-bad-guys-mode and many claimed they were willing to throw out the constitution for the appearance of safety. That isn’t the case in 2009. This old argument is given a new frame in this later context: civil protester. Bauer’s defense, which mimics the Bush Administration’s defense in their last-minute propaganda drive, attempts to lure us into a false dichotomy that is even more dangerous now than it was in ’04: civil disobedience for the public good vs. following the law at the expense of the public good. Jack Bauer, originally cast as an anti-hero, is now being drawn up as a saint and conscientious objector (figure that one out!).

The problem with this understanding is, of course, that the false dichotomy is truly false. The facts are on the side of torture’s opponents—torture is a less effective method of information gathering, and always has been—while the ideological support is there, as well.

But here is my real argument. Ideological struggle must be met with a willingness to not only accept punishment, but welcome it. Protestors that immolated themselves recognized that the sacrifice of their very life matched the integrity of their ideology (opposition to the Vietnam War). Those protesters that were beaten and abused in Seattle for their protest of the G8 summit in 1999 not only understood what was likely to happen to them, but demonstrated the veracity of their argument by accepting punishment—just or unjust. The civil rights movement employed this concept to such a degree that the entire decade of the 1960s is wedded to ideological protest. Most important, however, is that these two concepts (ideology and acceptance of punishment) are necessarily linked—causally linked, actually.

This is where Jack Bauer comes in. He is now being cast as this same type of protester, whose ideological position on torture will necessarily put him at odds with the authorities who will (rightly or wrongly) punish him. The show, however, doesn’t see Jack as a criminal, but one of greater conscience, who makes the 'tough decisions that we don’t have to.' Except that Jack doesn’t get punished. I don’t know what has happened so far or what is going to happen this season—as I said, I’m not watching it—but I can’t imagine Jack will land in a prison cell, and if he does, it won’t be for long. In fact, Jack’s punishment will nowhere near fit the crime—which is the problem with the Jack Bauer as protester scenario. Jack is praised for his work by the very show itself, not to mention vindicated by a prosecutor that shortly into the season encourages Jack to do some more torturing.

This has broad implications for the outgoing Bush Administration, as well. They have been making this same Jack Bauer argument on their history-revision tour. They set up the false dichotomy, trot out their talking point that we are safer now because of torture, and that they are being crucified in the media. If they were true warriors of conscience and believed in their moral superiority, they would not only welcome prosecution and trials, but actually hope for them. The trials themselves would test both the fortitude of the protester and the very mettle of the ideology itself. Christian martyrs gained intellectual, theological, and spiritual power in their willingness to embrace sacrifice for a greater good through adherence to a higher legal code. That the Bush Administration began using and codified a practice that is both abhorrent and ideologically incompatible with the Constitution while simultaneously using political and legal means of self-preservation demonstrates the weakness of their ideology. Even in light of Vice President Cheney’s virtual daring of the Obama Administration to prosecute him, the Bushies are entirely unaware of the manner in which they have compromised their own position.

There can be only one truth about this time in U.S. history, and it was something that Jonathan Turley suggested on Countdown on Friday: if the United States chooses not to prosecute its own perpetrators of war crimes, then the world will be forced to. In that instance, the problem of torture will not only be Bush’s, but it will then be ours.

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Bailout Hypocrisy, part 2

2008-12-08T11:42:00.001-05:00

Double Standards

In an ongoing series of bailout related news, I am taking the whos of the previous question one further and to wonder what is different between the financial sector and the auto secter.

The media has started to pick up on this story and wonder about it, but I don’t know that it is breaking through, so here it is: why do financial institutions get free cash in amounts of hundreds of billions of dollars and the Big Three Automakers have asked for a few billion in loans, Congress suddenly needs for them to account for every penny and plead their case. When Chicken Littles at Bear Stearns and AIG say that the sky is falling, Congress can’t act fast enough and can’t be saddled with demands for financial scrutiny. But when GM and Ford appear before Congress, hat-in-hand, they say “come back in a couple of weeks when you’ve got your s--- together.”

Another double standard? AIG spent tons on a spa, and Citi, after its $25 billion from Congress, turned around and spent $400 million of that to name the NY Mets’ new ballpark. When the head of GM flew to Washington in his private jet, he was berated as “out of touch”. He needed to make a show of it with his return to Washington in a Chevy Malibu. The hat-in-hand wasn’t good enough, eh?

Rachel Maddow astutely pointed out the real difference between giving $700 BILLION (so big it needs caps) to Wall Street and lending $25 billion to Detroit is just that: Wall Street versus Detroit. The sums and conditions are just icing on the cake. Because Wall Street provides us with a few white collar jobs, these institutions are too big to fail, while Detroit provides us with many blue collar jobs, so they can freely hang out on the chopping block. Regardless of whether these institutions really need our money and regardless of their mistakes, the difference between what happens when these industries fail can never come to the table because Still Pres. Bush and Congress have taken the credit industry out of the discussion. They’ve given a free pass to all of the bad actors, and pig-headed executives while leaving Detroit out to dry. This is really what they think about the so-called Middle Class.

And as they flush it down the toilet, communities that have driven the entire country’s economy and saved us during WWII are to be flushed right down with it. If the Democrats aren’t careful, they just might irrevocably alienate the Midwest the way they did with the Civil Rights Act.

Bailout Hypocrisy, part 1

2008-12-04T12:05:00.001-05:00

Who doesn’t love a hypocrite?

Here we are, two months after we were told that the sky was going to fall without a bailout of the financial sector. And lo and behold…it is still standing! Crisis averted!

But here is the question of the hour (and has been for many hours now): who gets ‘em? Which institutions get bailed out?

Bear Stearns
AIG
not Lehman Bros.
Citi
not yet, Big Three!

Is anyone minding this store? Is anyone paying attention to what is going on with this money? Does anyone care? Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Paulson asked for a blank check of $700 BILLION and pretty much got it from a compliant Congress.

Secretary Paulson is the former Chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs, a company that directly benefited from the downfall of Lehman Bros.

Then he decides that after spending only 1/3 of the money, that he would save the rest for the next president. Nobody seems to be asking why he needed $700 Bil if he were only going to spend $250.

Then he changed his mind again.

Do we have any better idea of who is getting this money?
Who will get this money?
Who has already received this money?
And what the criteria is for receiving this money?

For some reason, these questions continue to go unanswered.

The scandal of Centrism

2008-12-02T11:30:00.001-05:00

The relationship between liberalism and conservatism is at an all-time irrelevance.

That modernist thinking of a linear spectrum with liberalism at the left end and conservatism at the right has not only become pervasive, it has encouraged both the intellectual world and the “real” world to check out from the conversation. It means that we don’t listen to either ‘wing’—that each one’s contributions can be easily ignored by the populous. It also means that the sweet spot of American politics is the mythic Center—a concept that I don’t know if we can easily define. Most adherents to centrism simply argue that liberals and conservatives “go too far” or they aren’t comfortable taking either position: two very different (and often at odds) philosophies!

But it has mostly been the conservative movement’s underlying pursuit of not only winning elections and governing as often as possible, but permanently defeating liberalism that has caused a whole-sale rejection of partisanship. Further exasperated by the media's ambivalence and criminal devotion to 'balance', the public interest in centrism therefore is actually the most dangerous ideology in America today.

Most dangerous. Worse than fundamentalism.

This is the true support of that dreaded relativism that ‘true believers’ rail against. Centrism as opting out of partisanship is not only a political dead-end, but it is a shocking reinterpretation of a truly new brand of conservatism—a maintenance of the status quo due to a lack of invigoration and new thinking. The Goldwater Conservative is both an obstructionist and a destroyer—intent on returning the world to a time that is past. A true conservative ideology is interested in maintenance and the eternal present. The purpose of planning for the future is so that tomorrow will look like today. The danger of new Centrism is that it seems to pursue this very purpose indirectly by stunting any prospective growth.

The truth is that political ‘camps’ are never truly at odds. They can only be at odds when one wants to grow and the other wants to shrink, when one wants to live and one wants to die, when one wants to buy and one wants to sell. These are issues, not ideologies. Liberals and Conservatives have different goals, different motivations, and different world views, but they both support the country. It is the same in the church. Anglo-Catholics and Evangelicals are traditional “wings” of the Episcopal Church and have often seen their church in very different ways, but they aren’t opposites. In the 19th Century, the Anglo-Catholics were motivated by stuff—vestments, holy hardware, etc.—while the Evangelicals were motivated by evangelism. Do these seem to be at odds? Is there any person in his or her right mind that would consider these as ‘opposites’? Would anyone truly feel the need to take a centrist position and broker a deal that pleases neither group? Of course not! This is ludicrous!

The current political landscape is balancing on a very delicate precipice. Do we take a step toward greater understanding, more transformational work, and faithful adherence to our core principles (as Christians and/or Americans) or do we fall many feet to a ground representing irreconcilable discord, disharmony, and denial? Perhaps this is the importance of our current season of hope. That we can start having opinions and yet work for the common good at the same time. That compromise can be a first step in collaboration—not an end result of legal whittling. That the people can actually take interest in their organizations without betraying that great public interest in centrism. To me, these are great reasons for hope.

On the Center-Right Myth

2008-11-18T12:27:00.001-05:00

We've all been hearing about this for some time. In fact, we've been pitched this same piece of bologna for decades--ever since the 1980 election, it seems.

It is also a favorite of the talk radio blowhards like Limbaugh and Hannity. It is almost as if they believe more in the understanding that if you repeat something enough times it will come true than they believe in their ideology itself. They say it so often that one can't help but think that they are trying to convince themselves.

The recent spate of belief in the United States as a conservative nation (or "center-right" as they are saying today) is an obvious powerplay to discourage the Democrats from doing what they are supposed to be doing. But there's something else here: that we could be center-anything.

Back in the middle of the Bush presidency when he put up two ridiculously inappropriate candidates for the Supreme Court, whose governing ideology seems to be whatever-I-think-the-Constitution-Framers-meant-regardless-of-what-they-said-as-filtered-through-a-20th-Century-conservative-lens (or in other words, fundamentalism), there was a move by the self-tagged "moderates", whose position wasn't so much to find a "center" position, but merely end debate--which meant ending the filibusters. In Congress, there is no such thing as a moderate.

It is like the current en vogue classification as "independent". The independents make the following argument:

I'm my own person. I don't let a party govern my ideology. I do what I want. I vote for what I want. Look at me! I'm an independent! My view is more important than those partisans. The 100 million or so people in the country that call themselves independents--we're different. We're our own people.

I never quite understood how one person can be an independent when the plurality of people claim to be independent. How can you be independent together? I might also suggest the following dictim:

If you voted in 2008 for more Democrats than Republicans, then for the next two years you shall be a Democrat.
If you voted in 2008 for more Republicans than Democrats, then for the next two years you shall be a Republican.
In the event of a tie, your party affiliation will be determined by your previous vote for president (2004).
If you did not vote for any candidate from any party (including Greens, Libertarians, etc), but only for non-partisan races and ballot initiatives, then you are allowed to maintain your independent status.
Independent status may be revoked when a vote for a non-partisan race contains candidates that have been endorsed by a party. This status will be brought before an unelected court of my choosing.

It seems to me that this Center-Right Myth says more about Daddy issues than it does about who we truly are. It is a desperate plea by conservatives to not be left behind in the new era: as if they don't actually believe in their own ideology. They need to stack the deck in their favor.

But the daddy issues are about us. About how we want to see ourselves. About who we are in relationship to our ancestors. Clinton and Bush II both seemed to reject their respective party's heritage in their models of governance. In an age in which the American people have had the most tremendous social influence on the world of recent memory, we have allowed a 'culture war' to lead us into regression. At a time in which we believe ourselves to be post-racial and beyond bigotry, we have allowed politics of race and sexual orientation to make our government one of the most oppressive in the world. Immigration, terrorism, torture, and rights for LGBT have revealed deeply-rooted racism, religious intolerance, and sexism in our political process of late. But these things in no way match our social ideology, personal philosophies, or the vision we have for the future.

In truth, when asked about virtually any issue, the vast majority of people take a liberal position: on education, healthcare, civil rights, free speech, religious tolerance, you name it. The only one that isn't that way is gun-rights, where it is something like 49% favor gun control. Everything else has the country supporting typically liberal positions. Cenk Uygur recently wrote the following in his column:

By the way, one more thing -- this has never been a center-right
country. Of course, there are pendulum swings in the political spectrum
and the country is more conservative at times and more progressive at
other times. But overall, we built the United Nations, we started the
idea of human rights, we expanded voting rights and civil rights for
everybody, we spread the idea of individual rights throughout the
world, and we even rebuilt our enemies after World War II. It is no
exaggeration to say that America is one of the most progressive
countries in the history of the world.

What Uygur gets right is American vision and a country at its most populist. Liberalism and conservatism in their classical senses are essential to the US's very constitution (and Constitution). But the truth of the American spirit is that progressive, liberal values must be the guide, as conservatism must serve as the conscience. Conservatism's very philosophy makes it unsuitable for governing, but essential for checking liberalism's ambition.

I don't think that the United States is center-anything. We are liberal and we are conservative. We are progressive and regressive. We are isolationist and boldly interventionist. Having disperate ideologies represents an American ambivilence, not an American Centrism. If the US is a nation of exceptionalism, then it is one of bold, progressive action. And if it isn't, than we must be one of the pack, like our European cousins. Neither description could be called "center-right". Perhaps it is time we claimed American Ambivilence as our honest rallying cry.

Civil war and the strange soul of the Republican Party

2008-11-17T15:55:00.001-05:00

According to juliewolf on Daily Kos, the Republican Party can be described according to 6 factions which are beginning a civil war. I actually agree with her completely. The suggestion is that each prominent Republican right now only represents part of the coalition, that seems close to losing libertarians and have already lost a great deal of religious and "values" voters.

But a question does remain, even after a resounding Democratic victory a couple of weeks ago: where is the Republican Think Tank crowd, the ones that have been spinning and re-spinning Barry Goldwaterisms for decades on this? These six groups represent the character, perhaps the various persona of the Republican Party, but where is its soul?

If Reagan is its patron saint, and his undergirding philosophy is wedded to the Goldwaterian bedrock, then what does the Think Tank Republican (TTR) think of the future of the Republican Party? I can't help but think that their answer would be "yes."

You read that correctly: What is the future of the Republican Party? Their answer would be "yes."

Confusing as a yes or no answer is to an essay question, I would suggest it is actually fitting. The anti-government wrecking crew that are the TTR have been actively seeking the end of government for decades. The purpose has been to both cripple the government so that it can't do anything and demoralize the public persona of government so that it cannot be relied upon.

I'm not really sure what the true purpose of this goal could be, as TTRs don't seem that interested in anarchy, and obsess enough about tax policy and unregulated profiteering to lead us to believe that they are most interested in a future in which the government goes bankrupt and corporations pick up the slack.

Also strange in this group of elite intelligensia is an inconsistent relationship with the place of and value of the United States. There appears to be an obsession with American superiority, while championing a system that erodes nationalism. In fact, "market fundamentalism" encourages us to worship a deity called "the market"--not only implying, but also flatly admitting that the market is more important than the nation. Evangelism begins the shift away from national boundaries toward incorporating diverse elements that are newly converted. But just as 19th Century missionaries (and even 21st C versions), the implication is that the newly converted are lesser and must continue to follow the lead of the originators. This creates a ruling class ideology that undergirds the authority of the United States.

This model seems to therefore reinforce its most blatantly absurd elements by relying on conflicting concepts: Western superiority and international equality. Throw in the dead government and you have world run by US-based multi-national corporations (who no longer need to have their offices in the Cayman Islands). But where does the authority come from in this model if companies are adversaries and the government is worthless? The pundits and Think Tankers, of course!

I know this may come off as ridiculous to most, but I can't help but wonder what is really going on in Grover Norquist's mind--and why he continues to get invited to Republican strategy sessions.

What it means

2008-11-05T17:39:00.002-05:00

This election has been a lot of things. And, if we know anything about the parasitic relationship between pundits and the media, then one thing is assured: we will have no shortage of evaluations that are a bit too simple, and just a bit too easy.

This is the election phenomenon. There can only be one reason for anything, or at least one big reason for anything, or perhaps the reason that things happen, as if it can be isolated from reality, put in a jar and placed on a shelf for future observation.

The last presidential election was that way. The people were split pretty well in half, just as they had been in 2000. The Iraq Conflict, Bush's approval, and the economy were all tanking, but hadn't reached catastrophic yet. Rove's slime machine was in force and the Democratic Party was in chaos. Exit polls showed "traditional values", Iraq, and economy as important issues, with only a few points separating them. And yet, we remember '04 as the "values voter" year. The height of the political power of the Right-Wing Evangelical Block Vote.

So what will 2008 be? Probably the 'change' election and the 'economy' election. Not to mention the 'historic' election.

But like 2004, there's a whole lot to it. And to see it, one thing has to be acknowledged: President-elect Barack Obama slaughtered McCain. He absolutely destroyed him.

Here are the Electoral Vote tallies for the last few decades:
2004: 286-252
2000: 271-267
1996: 379-159
1992: 370-168

Since the 1960s and the birth of the "Southern Strategy", the only Democrats to win have been Southerners (Carter and Clinton). Nixon, Reagan, and Bush I all won big.

The truth though, is that Bush II actually represents the end. The end of the life of this strategy. His two "elections" represent two of the three closest in modern history.

Obama's campaign seems to represent the next cycle as much as McCain's tried to exemplify the old one. This is why I consider this entire election to be a broad and complext rejection of the 'Neos'. It isn't just a rejection of the Republican Party (which it clearly was), but a rejection of the characteristic ideology of both parties: neoconservatism and neoliberalism. In defeating Sen. John McCain, Obama not only will end the reign of neoconservatism in Washington, but has made the very ideology appear grusome and inhumane: a direct reflection of the Southern Strategy's use of race and culture (xenophobia). The Obama campaign seemed to simply pulled the cloak off this dispicable approach to politics, driving the vampires into hiding.

But in as much as Obama's election repudiates neoconservatism and its unholy marriage between market fundamentalism and war/human lives as a comodity with which the market could be fed, it also is a repudiation of neoliberalism. Both ideologies required hawkishness toward and blind devotion to both market solutions and military interventions. Obama's victory over Sen. Hillary Clinton in the primaries is a visible and symbolic victory over the neoliberal ideology that predominated the Democratic Party in the late 1980s and throughout the 1990s.

Both of these ideologies, that ushered in an era of innefective government, served to strip the country of its community and ability to collaborate--the very heart of Obama's appeal.

So, as we all put the champaigne down and begin to stare at the harsh realities around us, perhaps we should avoid those simple and easy descriptions, remembering how significant the time is, how different it is from 2004, 2000, even 1992, or 1980. Obama's dramatic defeat of the two predominating ideologies will take a while to process. It will take a new president to guide us to what this means. Is it traditional liberalism in the mode of LBJ and FDR, or is it something new? Something that we might not even recognize?

Happy Election Day!

2008-11-04T17:25:00.001-05:00

I love election day!

Have a great time and enjoy voting!

Pot about Kettle: They know what "black" looks like, too!

2008-10-30T17:44:00.001-04:00

I love this. Rick Davis, spokesman for the McCain/Palin campaign went out and suggested that Sen. Barack Obama's campaign gets a "free pass" on negative campaigning (story here).

Here's the thing. Negative campaigning isn't the problem. It never was the problem. It's McCain/Palin's 1) constant negative campaigning since June and 2) the veracity of the negative campaigning. It's the terrorist/Bill Ayers/ACORN's stealing the election/Obama's angry and uppity and elitist and dangerous/"he's using the race card"/inexperienced/etc. line of attacks that has gone on unendingly for the past 4+ months. Most of his attacks have been way over the line and have led to inciting violence and racial epithets (see previous posts).

Sen. McCain's campaign has not only been over-the-line, and continuously so, but has never shied away from encouraging racism. I couldn't care less whether or not McCain is a racist or whether or not anyone from his campaign is a racist, but his ads, his speeches, and the tenor of his campaign has not only encouraged racism toward Sen. Obama, but seem to have tried to find a way to get the racists onto its side.

Lastly, and perhaps most disturbing in the political world, is that I have been an active follower of this campaign season since last summer and I have to tell you this:
I can't tell you what John McCain stands for.
Think about it for a second. What is McCain's vision statement? What are his plans for the first 100 days in office? What would the McCain presidency look like?

I know he has it in for earmarks. I know he thinks that his dad being an admiral and his being shot down and held as a P.O.W. gives him military cred, but I'm not sure what he wants to do with diplomacy. He likes being in Iraq. He doesn't want to talk with our enemies. That's it. He likes having a "mavericky" VP that might get impeached before the swearing in ceremony on January 20th. What are his economic plans "I'm not going to raise taxes." Great solution--in that it actually is the opposite of one. Um...that's about it.

McCain/Palin has been so negative that it doesn't have any positive contribution. It can't tell you what its administration would look like--just what it isn't. And even that is inconsistant, since it is clearly not like Bush's, except the 90% that's identical. We'll have a spending freeze except on anything that is remotely related to running the government. Honestly, I don't get it.

So here it is. We are less than a week away, and a news junky cannot give a positive assessment of anything one of the candidates has planned for the country. This is in stark contrast to the 30 minute Obama infomercial last night that was on point, explaining economic, international, healthcare, and education priorities, with tangible plans for the first year.

So, Mr. Davis, as you cry foul, has it ever occurred to you that the problem has absolutely nothing to do with us, but in fact, everything to do with you?

The Bush Enigma

2008-10-27T11:02:00.001-04:00

It’s too early to write a political eulogy, of course, as his final term is not over yet. And the next person hasn’t even been chosen yet, the one in the unenviable position of cleaning up his mess.

And yet, the one truth that must be addressed before we are able to bury the specter of the George W. Bush presidency is this: the existential crisis of the enigmatic, straight-shooting candidate vs. the belligerent, tyrannical president. That George was a different person as a candidate (both times) from who he was as president is not as surprising as the schizophrenic degree to which the compassionate conservative who wanted to reform government morphed into the emperor demanding our country’s transformation into a near-fascist state.

I figure I will address the monster-in-chief at a later date. But I am more interested in the former, the enigmatic candidate.

First, I will confess that this inspiration came from a review in Entertainment Weekly of the new Bush biopic W. by Oliver Stone. I have not yet seen the movie (though I want to). But the review seemed to expect Stone to either address his subject as a neutral subject, long dead and gone: Ray Charles, Shoeless Joe Jackson, etc.: or as if he were a left-winger bent on revenge. If Stone produces the former, the reviewer could be disappointed for Stone’s lack of vision and if he delivers the latter Stone could be condemned for being a partisan hack (film reviewers can have it both ways). Stone, in including most of the important background info, produced a film that is scattered and unfocused according to the reviewer. A “C+” it receives. All of the praise is reserved for Josh Brolin’s performance as the title character. He seems to channel the spirit of George without relying on ticks and other acting crutches. He gets an “A” for his performance.

What the review for a simple film actually reveals is the true zeitgeist of our 43rd president: a man that we all know without caring to know about. That he is in fact, just a face to us: a living caricature of a president with an archetypal past. We know what we need to know: he was a spoiled rich kid that everyone liked; he rebelled as a teenager, as a young man, and as an adult; his father paved the way for his path to the presidency. He is a born-again Christian who continues to rebel against his East-Coast pedigree by fulfilling his Texas-based dreams of being a cowboy. He is simple and plain and hopelessly devoted to his Dad’s ideology: oil is a good money-maker. This seems to be enough for us. We avoid the truth, even when it is presented to us.

He was an adequate student. He is charismatic and lived on that charisma through his entire life, including his time as president. He uses nicknames to manipulate and gain power over people—a subtle, “folksy” tactic that shows disdain for the individual (only friends get to give you nicknames—the journalist makes the leap to believe that they are now the president’s friend). That charisma got him power and influence that he could not earn on merits of skill, past performance, or knowledge.

Everything George has done in his life has been on someone else’s dime. His Dad’s friends lent him money to start an oil exploration company that failed. Then those friends bought the failed company and reinvested in it, promoting George to head of the new, bigger company. It failed. Then those friends bought it out, promoting George again to head the new, bigger company. He left with millions in his pockets and a 0% success rate in the oil business. Then, he gathered more of those same friends and bought the Texas Rangers. Even though he was only worth 2%, he was given control of the team. His biggest trade resulted in sending Sammy Sosa to the Cubs—before he hit 66 home runs. He was given more stock in the team than was warranted by his ownership position, but we know what that was about, really. By this time he was son of the President of the United States of America. He quits the business world to run for governor of Texas against a popular incumbent. Big bucks flowed in from Washington and a couple of Karl Rove smears later, he is governor of one of the biggest states in the country with absolutely no credentials for the job. His military record demonstrates the same nepotism and favoritism that typified his business activities, getting appointments that he didn’t earn (he failed the flying tests and he was demoted) as well as an early exit that was not endorsed or sanctioned (in other words, he went AWOL).

He is a recovering alcoholic and former drug-user (cocaine). His party-animal reputation continued past his teens and early-twenties and into his late thirties.

So why did anyone think that this man could be fit for the presidency? Because we didn’t really want to examine that past. We knew about it. It was reported and put on the nightly news. Half of us didn’t really care. The other half didn’t take it seriously (“Aren’t they seeing this?” we asked). But this isn’t a Republican/Democrat divide thing. This is willful ignorance. This is willful abandonment of our values.

We expect our president to represent our values. We expect our president to tell us what s/he is going to do. During a campaign, we invite them to prove their worth to us in speeches, debates, and explaining their policy priorities. For some reason, George got a free pass. He used circular non-logic, word-smithing, and character and ethic debates to derail the discussion that we all say we want. And then we blamed VP Al Gore for what came out of Bush’s mouth. And then again to Sen. John Kerry four years later.

George W. Bush the candidate seemed to combine all of the things we dislike about typical presidential candidates (inherited wealth, privilege, a Messiah-complex, insulated upbringing), attitudes that cause us to reject a candidate out-of-hand (drug problem, unsuccessful business background, accounting scandal), and personality traits that cause the electorate to worry (intellectual laziness, hot-headedness, belligerence, blind adherence to faulty logic). And yet, we didn’t care. He seemed to be the embodiment of all the things we dislike with a sprinkle of folksiness and charisma, but all we saw was swagger. Even after he perpetrated the greatest fraud on the American people in the history of our country, we didn’t push him out of office: we let him steal another election. So he upped the ante and we still didn’t get him impeached.

In Bush, we can see where the monster comes from: we can understand how George was able to take the power from those that didn’t guard it wisely. But what is inexplicable is that Bush could maintain that enigma after Election Day. How, in plain view, our democracy could be high jacked with a wink and a nod. Maybe it is charisma. Maybe Bush is just that good. Or maybe it really is us. Maybe it’s our own intellectual laziness that allowed us to trust the untrustable. Maybe it’s our own self-loathing that wanted to be mistreated. Maybe we want the book written about this time to say, like Esau, that we did this because we despised our birthright.

Palin and the scandal of wasting other people's money

2008-10-22T16:04:00.002-04:00

You no doubt have heard about these hilarious financial scandals involving the Republican Vice Presidential candidate. The first was the thousands of dollars she forced the Alaskan taxpayers to pay for her per diem—while staying at home. Next was the tens of thousands spent on flights and five-star hotels for her daughters. Now she has spent $150,000 of the Republican National Committee’s money on clothes and makeup.

Jeez, if I didn’t know better, I’d say that she seems to have some problems with the basic concepts of conservatism.

So here’s the thing: don’t attack her for the clothes and the kids (both are actually pretty reasonable expectations). Instead, attack her for this: she really seems to like spending other people’s money. Not just spending it, wasting it. Blowing it. Look at the evidence: she expects the Alaskan people to pay her to stay in her home, spending the night in expensive hotels (while getting a second room for her kids--who weren't invited in the first place), and presumably on high-fashion clothes.

The reality of this argument is not that I expect the governor to stay at a Motel 6, 100 miles from downtown or to shop at TJ Maxx, but I do expect some frugality and responsible stewardship of funds.

Think about the state jet. Alaska, a huge state, much of which is only reachable by airplane, now only has a 28 year-old plane. One that was out of commission for 1/3 of Palin's time in office so far. The other plane, the one that her predicessor purchased so that he could, presumably, meet with constituents in his own state, was sold...at a loss. She jeapordized Alaskan infrastructure--and lost money.

In all, these issues reveal two things about Palin: her economic unfitness as an officer of the state and her selfish greed as an individual.

As a governor, she wastes her people's money. She shows little to no prudence and foresight with regards to the economic health of her state. She uses Band-aids when stitches are required. This inspires no confidence in me as she hopes to get to be a heartbeat away from our country's multi-trillion dollar economy.

As a public servent, she greedily extorts the state for her personal gain. This isn't stealing pencils from the office closet, this is bending loopholes in obviously inappropriate ways. The per diem is intended to cover travel, hotel, and food expenses on trips to visit constituants, not a little extra pay for going home. Her visits away from home didn't require first class travel and accomodations for the entire family. She probably could have kept the kids at home with "First Dude", her sepretist husband. And with the deep pockets of the Republican Party footing the bill, she felt no remorse in racking up clothing and makeup bills in the last two months that are greater than the average household makes in two years.

Palin's eagerness to waste other people's money should be a chilling reminder of what is at stake in the current economic environment. We have spent 8 years under one Republican with neither the ability to act with fiscal prudency, nor the moral fortitude to keep from benefiting from the arrangement. Mavericky? No. Bushy.

McCain supporters commit violent acts

2008-10-21T11:08:00.001-04:00

At the last debate, Sen. Barack Obama looked Sen. John McCain in the eye and gave him the opportunity to repudiate the supporters that have called for Obama's death. And what did he do? He complemented his supporters. He thinks their great.

Also during the debate, McCain raised the specter of voter fraud--a favorite Republican bogeyman that actually encourages vote suppression--because of a successful ACORN recruitment effort. So what happens just days after the debate? Those wonderful patriots, those incredible citizens that support McCain vandalize ACORN offices and send death threats to ACORN personnel all over the United States as reported by McClatchy Newspapers.

This is what happens when a presidential candidate stokes the racist fears of the puritanical xenophobes. This demonstrates the danger of the McCain/Palin rhetoric--it has begun spilling over into direct, violent action. It has moved from shouting death threats to carrying out criminal acts in the form of breaking and entering, theft, and vandalism. What is next? What will it take for McCain to reject these acts?

And what does it say about his character? What kind of maverick lets his supporters behave this way? What kind of high-minded citizen and dutiful public servant stays silent; or worse, defends those who have gone to far? Perhaps only one who recognizes his own guilt and complicity in tearing the country apart.

A perfect Special Comment

2008-10-15T11:14:00.003-04:00

Last night's Countdown featured the Special Comment I've been waiting for: a plea for McCain and Palin to stop the violent rhetoric. Check it out!

A great comic strip

2008-10-14T16:20:00.001-04:00

My favorite comics are the ones that make me laugh--and a bit upset. Take a look at this one. It is on Susan Russell's blog, and I just couldn't take credit for finding it!

McCain's gambit and the problem with betting it all

2008-10-13T17:21:00.001-04:00

After reading this article on Alternet, which seems to reinforce the statements I've been making for the last week about the McCain/Palin campaign's hate-speech, new things became obvious to me. Through quotes by journalists and polticians, the article shows the widespread opposition to this strategy, from condemnation as hate-speech at one end to being politically unhelpful at the other.

What is interesting, however, is the original response to this stuff when taken through the lens of what it could lead to. Let me explain. In the spring, when Sen. Hillary Clinton was losing ground in the primaries to Sen. Barack Obama, she began mudslinging with some borderline inappropriate suppositions. The response at the time to "the Kitchen Sink Approach" came in the form of three predominant viewpoints: she is fighting to the end (Hillary supporters), she is handing the Republicans a ready-made campaign (moderate Democrats), she has descended her campaign into the hell that political campaigns must avoid, namely racism and fear (Obama supporters). When McCain came out slinging at Obama, eager to paint him as unsuitable for the presidency, the worst fears of all (and the total expectation of the majority) of Democrats were realized: a campaign that was destructive and nasty--and entirely worse than anything in recent memory.

But here's the thing that I don't understand--the long-odds gamble. When Sens. Clinton and McCain started throwing whatever they could find at Sen. Obama, arguing that they are demonstrating what fighters they are, how driven they are to protect America from whatever Obama is supposed to represent, why is it construed by supporters, and worse, the media as "the only choice" and "all [they] have left"? Isn't pride, decency, and the very fabric of our country's political future worth preserving? Why shred our ability to transcend partisanship in favor of a selfish desire to do literally everything possible to become president?

Let me say this again, because it is that important. McCain has a choice. He doesn't have to be a nasty jerk. He doesn't have to throw his honor out the window and toss his scruples. He doesn't have to make a deal with the devil and compromise the country. He doesn't have to go about spouting vile garbage, insighting riots and lynch mobs. He has a choice. He has the option of winning or losing as a decent man. He has the option of being a humane and humble leader. But he's not. He is selfish. He is willing to throw three decades of public service in the toilet, flushing it with an angry hand because he is that desperate and selfish. He is out of options and in his mind, the only thing left is to tear it all down. Like a child playing with Legos and has trouble dealing with a better castle being made by another kid, he is willing to stomp on them, breaking the legos, the playmat, ruining the opportunity for himself, the other kid, and any other children that hope to play there in the future.

McCain has always had another option. A candidant doesn't have to live by the mindset: by any means necessary. You don't have to ruin things for everyone when you don't get your way. You can choose to run a good, high-minded campaign with every intention of winning. You can be a good sport. You can show people how's it's done: by being a role model for other political figures.

Nobody wants to see their husband, their father, or worse, their son running the type of campaign that McCain has. It is dishonorable and indecent: it is the definition of obscene. But what is truly tragic is that McCain had all the means of running that other campaign. He had the opportunity to actually be a Maverick, not pretend to be one. He had the opportunity to unite the people under important principles of bipartisan unity and debate--he could have made disagreement cool and useful, not a constant means of division. He had the opportunity to redeem the Republican Party and helped us work toward forgiveness. He had the the opportunity to be an inspirational figure. He had the opportunity to out post-partisan his opponent. He had the opportunity to do all of these things. And at the end, regardless of how the chips fell, he could have won an historic and politically unprecedented election based on optimism, respect, and honor. All of that was possible. But he chose Rove's disciples to run his campaign and chose the low road, only worse. He chose the subterranian road.

Maybe now we will understand that when you've run out of cards, you don't need to bet it all.

John Stewart, I love you, but get on this!

2008-10-09T11:43:00.001-04:00

I was reflecting on something John Stewart said in the last issue of Entertainment Weekly. He suggested that he expected the Obama-McCain election season to be different, to be something new. He was disappointed that we are at the same place we were at with Bush-Gore and Bush-Kerry.

He suggests that the campaign season hasn't improved. Of course, I think it has gotten worse, but Stewart is looking at historical benchmarks as equals. By saying that things haven't appeared to improve (kind of a vague, non-descript word), he seems to suggest that the 2008 benchmark is comparable to the 2004 and 2000 benchmarks. I would reject this for two reasons. First, this is a narrow sampling of benchmarks. If all are truly equal, and things are consistently bad, let's include 1992, let's use 1980 and 1976. Perhaps even 1968, 1960, or 1932! These benchmarks can give the broad view that Stewart is suggesting, but with a more reasonable understanding of politics.

The second reason is the one that interests me more. It is the idea that even though Sen. John McCain is trying to do his best to be George W. Bush Revisited, Sen. Barack Obama certainly cannot be Sen. John Kerry or Vice President Al Gore. A more apt political comparison would be Govs. Bill Clinton or Jimmy Carter, whose campaign staff were from outside of Washington. Or perhaps John F. Kennedy, who is known for having both a "typical" staff and trusted confidants that could tell him the truth. This is not what Gore and Kerry had in their campaigns.

But neither is really the reason things are different this time around, and why many things don't seem better. Yes, there is a back-and-forth. There is a "my opponent says this, but..." case--but we are naive (or stupid) if we think that will change. No, what is different is difference between logic and hyperbole, critical thinking and shouting, cogent arguments and lies. This is the state of the campaign.

To be fair, things don't look different. But perhaps that has nothing to do with the candidates or our reality. Perhaps it has everything to do with the way we are covering things today, and what today means when it becomes yesterday. With Stewart's harping on things not being different, he is trying to absolve himself of that responsibility for shaping how we perceive current events.

I like him. I think he's hilarious. I think he covers things the way I wish the network news teams would. I think he seems to be unafraid to tell the truth when it needs to be told. But I don't think he pushes the line. His cynicism betrays the current arrangement. As I said in the previous post, McCain/Palin have given up lying and moved into reality-fabrication. They are not only saying something that isn't true, but creating a frame that is incredibly dangerous. They are pushing a worldview that has a dangerous endpoint that can only lead to violence or sedition. They have gone way past the line of acceptability and moved into the mad dogs of our past like the segregationist's run for the presidency through fear and racism. They are adopting a platform that isn't merely racist and bigoted, but one that encourages hatred.

John Stewart is not picking up on this reality. No one else is either, but we have come to expect more from him. We have come to expect wisdom and clarity of vision. We have come to expect truth-telling in the face of adversity. And yet, silence. Actually, worse than silence. He is belittling this American moral crisis by simply suggesting that things haven't improved from 2004 or 2000. No, they haven't, but a true moral crime is being committed on the American people: we are being stripped of decency. For the love of God, McCain and Palin are tacitly endorsing assassination and mob 'justice' against a supposed terrorist sympathizer! That is what there words imply.

But then again, we're all cynics now. We had big hopes in the early 90's and Bill let us down when he made us parse the word "is". When he tried to get out of lying about sex, joining Pres. Nixon in the Hall of Shame. We think that all politicians are of equal 'bad'. We say they both take money from evil corporations (even when the ratio is 90/10). We act as if it is all equal. And we act as if we aren't complicit in defining "now".

When an employee screws up, you put a note in their file. If they screw up again, you write them up. Then, when they really screw up, when they cross the line, you have ample cause for firing them. You don't overlook the little stuff and pretend the problem will go away. McCain has messed up from day one and we have given him free passes every week. Now that he's gone too far, what are we to do? We are implicated in 'the now' by what we failed to do yesterday.

Here's to hoping that our journalists take responsibility for themselves today. That they take responsibility for how they cover the candidates and this election. That they take responsibility for the way they shape our understanding of reality. We can't keep relying on the American people's ability to spot a bad apple when they keep acting as if both are bad--or worse--that they are both edible.

When Mudslinging becomes Hate Speech

2008-10-08T12:10:00.003-04:00

Here is the frightening truth of what mudslinging from the right can mean: it might be more than just words.

I've blogged before about the impact of hate speech on TV, radio, and in books written by TV personalities such as Rush Limbaugh, Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Ann Coulter. These people speak about murder, rape, and other violent acts as hyperbole--as a means of expressing the size of their outrage.

Besides being crass, crude, and inappropriate for anyone on TV (the same TV that fears Janet Jackson's nipple), these statements are dangerous if we are to see even the slightest truth in them. When one talks about wanting to drag someone into the street and having them shot, isn't the impression that you actually do wish bodily harm on that person? Even if you aren't making a suggestion to anybody in particular, aren't you at the very least suggesting that "it would be nice if it happened"?

Now, I'm a fan of Keith Olbermann's special comments, and this one from Monday night was excellent:

Olbermann describes Gov. Sarah Palin, not just as someone living in a glass house, but pointing out that her own criteria for damning Sen. Barack Obama as a terrorist actually makes her one. In fact, it makes her more of one.

Olbermann further goes after the very fabric of her mudslinging. I almost wish that he had waited and read this article by Jeffrey Feldman about what Gov. Palin appears to actually being saying: that she wants a United States Senator to be brought up on treason and terrorism charges or that a civilian mob should kill him. Take your pick.

The truth is that there is really only one avenue for the way the McCain/Palin campaign is going. The nature of the rhetoric, the very substance of their attacks is to charge Obama as a dangerous enemy. The strategy appears to imply that they think that they can get on a transcontinental train, get off at some spot in the middle of the country and that the train won't keep going--and that they aren't responsible for its travel. Or, like the movie Speed, they've strapped a (figurative) bomb to a bus, set the trip at 45 mph and let someone else get in the driver's seat.

The violent rhetoric spoken with both a visceral and (attempted) authentic disdain for Obama and then later with a wink, a smile, and "You betcha", seem to be heard as marching orders. The recent shouts at rallies of "treason", "terrorist", and "kill him" are the obvious and natural outgrowth of the nasty, hate-filled stump speeches by McCain and Palin.

So what does this mean? What are we going to do about hate-speech masquerading as campaigning? What are we going to do that will prevent a future examination of the present that doesn't say "Didn't they see it? What's wrong with those people?" What are we going to do to prevent such terrible violence from becoming a reality?

He's no maverick

2008-10-07T15:44:00.001-04:00

Here's a great article from the New York Times about the orgin of the word "maverick" and the family name from which it is drawn.

By any definition, Sen. John McCain cannot be called a maverick. And to consider Gov. Sarah Palin one is a bigger slap in the face.

The honesty-deficit and elections

2008-10-06T09:59:00.001-04:00

In a college class on mass communication, I read about the 60/40 principle, which stuck with me. It goes something like this: Republicans and Democrats always debate about the effectiveness of welfare. Democrats support it while Republicans oppose it. To defend their positions, Democrats traditionally use a statistic that showed approximately 60% of all welfare recipients were off of welfare within a year. This is intended to prove that the average welfare recipient is not living on welfare forever. Republicans use a similar statistic that showed approximately 40% of all welfare recipients go off of welfare only to return within three years. This is intended to prove that welfare is abused. Like every other discussion, they aren’t arguing about the same thing: the Democrat is talking about the average person and the Republican is eager to pick out the exception to the rule. What it does highlight, however, is the honesty-deficit inherent in the discussion. Both parties attempt to paint a picture that benefits them. But this often leads to outright deception and obvious falsehoods.

You would have to go back to the late 1970s before you can find a president with real integrity. Pres. Jimmy Carter is known for his honesty and “plain-speaking” (before that became a euphemism for bad grammar) and the victim of this honesty-deficit. Modern political scientists suggest that he would have been a better president if he had lied to us, instead of telling us the truth.

Carter’s successors are all known almost as much for their fabrications as they are for any successes: Reagan (trickle-down economics, Iran/Contra), Bush I (“read my lips: no new taxes”), Clinton (“I did not have sexual relations with that woman”), and Bush II (you know the list) all suffered and benefited from an honesty-deficit.

So here we are today: living with a standard that suggests that not only is lying a given, but it is acceptable. Not only is lying a better option than telling the truth, it is considered a mistake if you tell the truth. Yes, Clinton may not have been impeached if he hadn’t lied, but Bush did lie about much more significant matters and he remained in office.

That is why I find this election season so intriguing. Then Gov. George Bush got away with all sort of lies in the 2000 election because the media was enraptured with him and had it in for Vice President Al Gore (check out this Rolling Stone article). In 2004, we allowed lies to circulate because we decided that it wasn’t our job to disprove them, it was the candidate’s; so Sen. John Kerry fell victim to the blatant lies of the Swiftboat ads. This time, Sen. John McCain is using the same advisors (Karl Rove disciples) including Rove himself (while pretending to be an independent journalist for Fox) to run the most negative campaign in recent memory against Sen. Barack Obama. What is interesting about this is that Obama doesn’t seem to be “fast and loose” with the truth, he seems to be assessing the situation and describing it accurately. McCain, on the other hand, seems to be in an all-out lie mode. He puts out cheap, misleading, and downright lying ads and then pretends like he doesn’t know about them in public appearances. He makes cheap, misleading and downright lying statements in speeches all across the country and then pretends like he doesn’t know about it during the debates. During the debate, he tries to score political points with calculated deceptions, such as the tax-increase bogeyman, despite unanimous third-party agreement that Obama won’t raise taxes on the middle class. McCain even knows he’s lying.

This seems to create a certain level of cognitive dissonance: when one is accustomed to “small” lying from candidates and minor deceptions, we aren’t usually that trusting of our candidates, but we want to afford them some credence as experts. But what do we make of debates in which one is a truth-teller and the other is a liar? How do we deal with that? What seems surprising to me is that Gov. Sarah Palin seemed even more adept than McCain at lying in public. Her debate positions were truly indefensible and show an entire lack of credibility.

The question remains: what do we do with this honesty-deficit, and more, this honesty gap? How does a conversation with someone continue when they claim that 2+2=5? How does the media cover such a campaign as that? And how does the voter judge the suitability of a candidate when honesty is not ensured? For the sake of the country, shouldn’t we do more than call McCain on his lies, but instead demand honesty? Shouldn’t he be disqualified from consideration?

We continue to fall for a racist frame

2008-10-01T12:31:00.001-04:00

When Karl Rove whispered in Junior’s ear a few years ago “let’s run for president”, he did so with a particularly juicy strategy: recast the melting pot as a hyper-realized fragmentation set to go to war. This strategy was much more subtle in 1994 as George W. Bush ran for governor and in his reelection campaign in 1998 (yes, the one in which he promised not to run for president in 2000). We saw it in full-bloom, however, in the 2000 and 2004 elections.

This story has been well-covered, but hardly examined. Just take a second to think about it. Rove’s strategy was to cast southern and western white men with little education and blue-collar jobs as “the real America”. The idea was that those people that live in cities (69% of the population) are fakers. Minorities and women have evil agendas and are stealing the white man’s rightful place as king. Education leads you to the dangerous place in which liberalism sounds pretty good. White men unite! We must take back our country. This was the ideology in 2000’s “Who would you rather drink a beer with?” [preposition placement intentional] and the NASCAR dad phenomenon. Both were euphemisms for southern, uneducated white men.

It was revised in 2004 to include women: remember the SUV-driving suburban soccer mom that was the target? However, with the Islamo-fear machine and the culture war rhetoric, these further polarizations' true intent was to encourage white men to respond in a particular way.

So here it was, in late 2007, and the Republicans trot out the frame with all of their candidates flopping over each other in an attempt to seem more racist, angry, and vile than the sitting president: “I’ll keep Gitmo.”, “Well, I’ll double it!”, “Hey, I’ll triple it!”: and then at some point, it dawns on them: we’re taking on a white woman or a black man. If we use our typical frame, people might actually see through it! We’ll have to make it a little more subtle.

But really, there was no need: the media did it for them. Raise your hand if you have heard the following statement from any number of network newscasts or read it in the paper somewhere: “Sen. Barack Obama has a white working-class male problem”. No need to reference NASCAR dads, no need to talk about the “real” America: the media names the frame for them.

But here’s the real question and the underlying concept: Isn’t the white working-class male a small part of the electorate? If Obama wins significant majorities of blacks (he will), women (likely), Hispanics (looking good), union workers (very solid), the proverbial ‘middle class’ voter (so far, so good), and even the wealthy (not out of the question!), why should he even bother taking a single white, working-class male? Is that a notoriously powerful demographic collectively?

Secondly, “working-class” happens to be a strange euphemism. It seems to imply labor that is traditionally middle class (manufacturing and agro-business) with lower-class pay and status. It isn’t referencing the working poor that work 40-60 hours a week at minimum wage (a large percentage of our work force), but at the same time doesn’t seem to refer to labor unions or skilled tradespersons. Perhaps it serves only as a proverbial representation: that auto mechanic that works on the corner with his four kids and has to pay medical insurance out of his pocket and all that he asks of his country is a little bit more of his paycheck in his pocket so that he can make ends meet. Oh, and bomb the terrorists: he hates those guys.

Isn’t this mercurial concept of “working-class” not another way to say poor redneck? Isn’t it another way to suggest that Barack Obama isn’t speaking for America if he’s got pretty much everyone on his side, just not the one demographic that matters: those poor white men? Isn’t it another way of saying that every demographic of society is less important than the southern white guy—the “real” American? Isn’t this the way of saying that Obama supports the terrorists if he doesn’t wear a flag pin, while Sen. John McCain’s wardrobe doesn’t matter? Isn’t this just another way of excusing overt racism?

So here it is. We have a black presidential candidate against a white one. One is in his prime and the other is significantly past his. One has spent the past year preparing and setting up a historic campaign with incredible infrastructure and planning and the other has spent the past year (or three) changing his position on every fundamental issue and reassuring his base that he’s one of them. Both claimed to be above traditional politics (only one of them actually is) and yet we are still talking about a small cross-section of America: the “working-class white male” as if there’s a chieftain that has to ‘sign off’ on Obama! As if white men get together in meetings to talk about whom they are going to endorse. Of course I’m not allowed to go because I went to college—only the uneducated are allowed. I don’t get to count in the white vote—I’m an elite. Plus, I live in a city of over 100,000, so I’m not a rural voter, so that’s a second strike against me—a second way I don’t count.

I thought about getting some statistics, poring through the census and finding numbers based on race and education, and it dawned on me: I don’t actually need them. This concept is that obvious. The middle class is a concept defined by percentage: the middle 50%. According to the amorphous and changing definition of working-class, it excludes the top 75%, and since it isn’t really about “the poor”, then we can discount the bottom 25%.

Or let’s look at it another way. Whites make up something like 55% of the population of the United States. Roughly half of those whites are women, meaning all white men make up about a quarter of the population. Again, not a majority by any stretch. Now exclude those with a college education and/or live in cities and you approximate a seemingly insignificant demographic group.

And yet, that demographic group gets a veto power in the election? Why this elevated status? Why does Obama’s candidacy require this support at all? The only minorities McCain has attempted to win over are Hispanics and women, both of whose support are compromised by his track record and his current behavior. Doesn’t McCain need universal endorsement, as Obama appears to, or are uneducated white men the “trump” in the discussion? Does McCain win the “trick” by getting the seeming endorsement of white men, while losing the vote of women, blacks, Hispanics, and other minorities? And what about other designations, which include labor and management? McCain is down 2-to-1 in active military personel, many of which come from this demographic that is McCain's "wheelehouse".

How is this not racism? Why aren’t we attacking the network news for this overt racism, for framing the discussion in this way? Why aren’t we calling for a campaign that, just once, doesn’t hold the southern, uneducated white man as the ‘real’ American, and instead embraces the incredible diversity of the American electorate? Oh, that’s right. Now we’re wondering how Jews in Florida are going to vote. For a second there, I thought we had a shot to reverse this racist trend.

Boasting of the flesh

2008-09-30T10:33:00.001-04:00

In my reading for today, I read chapters 5 & 6 of Galatians and Psalm 41. I'm reading The Daily Message by Eugene Peterson, which means that I get a scriptural reading in The Message translation. And what I came across really struck me.

A while back, I wrote this response to the LA Times that got the Far Right all in a "twitter" about my evil liberalism. I have read comments and letters carrying such incredible venom, that I can hardly stand it. I have been charged with many things, perhaps the scariest is that I am a good Episcopalian! Oh the horror!

It is with this frame that I came across Paul's teaching to the Galatian church that got me thinking. In Gal. 6:12-16, Paul states:

It is those who want to make a good showing in the flesh that try to compel you to be circumcised--only that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ. Even the circumcised do not themselves obey the law, but they want you to be circumcised so that they may boast about your flesh. May I never boast of anything except the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything; but a new creation is everything! As for those who will follow this rule--peace be upon them and mercy, and upon the Israel of God. [NRSV]

Of course, this wasn't what I read, but what I turned to after. This is the translation I read from The Message:

These people who are attempting to force the ways of circumcision on you have only one motive: They want an easy way to look good before others, lacking the courage to live by a faith that shares Christ's suffering and death. All their talk about the law is gas. They themselves don't keep the law! And they are highly selective in the laws they do observe. They only want you to be circumcised so they can boast of their success in recruiting you to their side. That is contemptible!

For my part, I am going to boast about nothing but the Cross of our Master, Jesus Christ. Because of that Cross, I have been crucified in relation to the world, set free from the stifling atmosphere of pleasing others and fitting into the little patterns that they dictate. Can't you see the central issue in all this? It is not what you and I do--submit to circumcision, reject circumcision. It is what God is doing, and he is creating something totally new, a free life! All who walk by this standard are the true Israel of God--his chosen people. Peace and mercy on them!

In reading this, I could not help but wonder about what causes the radical right such anger and begets such ire. I also couldn't help but notice the circumcision argument. The first great fight in the church, Paul vs. James over the notion of circumcision represents the greatest theological conversation in church history. In some ways, we are still dealing with its repercussions and ramifications.

On the one hand, you have Jewish law and scriptural-based traditions that required every Jew to be circumcised. Further, the practical rationales included the simple fact that Jesus, James, Peter, John, and even Paul were all circumcised. To be a follower of Jesus, from this view, was to be Jewish. Some might consider this to be orthodoxy before there was such a thing.

From the other point of view, we have Paul's ministry to the gentiles. Paul (rightly) recognizes Jesus's willingness to bend and break Jewish laws when they impeded the Great Commandment. This means that Paul's understanding of Jesus's teaching was to spread the Good News to all people, regardless of their heritage. By this, I think, we are still in unanimous agreement. Where it gets sticky, though, is in the part where Paul does not require circumcision of the gentiles, that new converts no longer have to follow the Jewish laws to which we previously adhered. This is a very different suggestion--and considering the current debate--one that we would not have an easy time today in answering.

And this brings up the root of the hypocrisy. If scripture is the central authority, how can we denounce Paul? It appears to me, that if we believe that the "orthodox" (James?) thing to do is to adhere to the law and the authority of Scripture, then how are we to respond to Paul's interpretation of the law? How do we teach this lesson? Do we then denounce Paul and throw into question or standing on scriptural authority? Or do we agree with Paul and, as the Pharisees, appear hypocritical in matters of theology? Or, as Sunday's gospel suggests, do we pretend that we don't know the answer?

As if that weren't enough, this was in the Psalm today (from The Message):
I said, "GOD, be gracious!"
     Put me together again--
     my sins have torn me to pieces."
My enemies are wishing the worst for me;
     they make bets on what day I will die.
If someone comes to see me,
     he mouths empty platitudes,
All the while gathering gossip about me
     to entertain the street-corner crowd.
These "friends" who hate me
     whisper slanders all over town.
They form committees
     to plan misery for me.

Hey, with friends like these...

Bailout failure brings country's memory back

2008-09-29T16:01:00.002-04:00

In the midst of the hardest decision Congress as ever been forced to make in recent memory, the House split over the bailout. Perhaps the split (which defeated the president's plan) represents the closest thing to the first public victory in the new millennium. Seemingly for the first time, the wishes of the people trumped the leaders of both parties, and loyalty to constituencies trumped loyalty to party.

This doesn't mean that the Democratic and Republican representatives that broke from their leadership did so out of unity or for the same reasons (they certainly didn't), but they did so in the midst of the most terrifying time in cultural memory. In September of 2001, the people were in shock--but certainly not this kind of fear. Market volatility and banking crises seemed, for the first time, to be linked with the recent past for people. All of a sudden, deregulation and free trade, gas prices and green energy initiatives, executive pay and unemployment seem to be colliding into the moment many have been waiting for: not a depression, recession, or any other condition, but in a great awakening of consciousness. Its as if things are new today and that our understanding has fundamentally changed.

Suddenly the Keating 5 and the Savings & Loan scandal, which has somehow eluded the election process, despite Sen. John McCain's unethical ties and personal experience from the 1980s having an eery similarity to today's conditions, is now coming up. In fact, it is coming up as people are trying to honestly assess the conditions and feverishly hope to find something in the past to inform our current status and have found it in Reagan's first great boondagle. And the fact that McCain (and his favorite economist, former Sen. Gramm) not only failed to learn the lesson of the S&L bailout, but in some twisted way, seemed eager to replicate it with our banks.

More surprising, I actually heard the following argument on the radio: an economist admitted that there isn't anything we can do. That the only thing that could have been done had to be done a decade ago. That nothing can be saved--perhaps only rebuilt.

And most shocking of all is perhaps the former genius, the former rock star of economics (and former Fed chief) Allen Greenspan is now on the hit list, taking a great deal of the heat for his "love of all things bubble" as it was recently described. His chairmanship, taking Reagan's reverse-economics to the extreme, gambling the entire economy on a principle that doesn't generate wealth for the country or for the poor or middle class, but a principle that could only and always, create wealth for the wealthy, these machiavelian economic philosophies are now being scruitinized for seemingly the first time.

And this moment, this time of political fear and economic shock, a time when it is bad to be a homeowner, a stockholder, or an employee, we are having a truly great awakening, a moment where the country can examine its leadership of the last three decades with sober eyes and say this: how did you fail us? You took an oath. You used your position for personal gain, selling out the country (not unlike politicians in the 1880s and 90's) and brought about the very conditions of a new Great Depression. How dare you ask for a second chance.

Oh, that Tina Fey

2008-09-29T15:07:00.002-04:00

Tina Fey is at it again! Her portrayal of Gov. Sarah Palin on last week's Saturday Night Live is even funnier than her first. But it does something truly incredible: it is helping expose the truth better than any news agency.

As Kurt Vonnegut so understood, and often quoted his literary predecessor, Mark Twain, truth is most successfully understood through humor. That is why it is comedians that have directed our cultural future throughout the 20th century (and why the Jerry Seinfeld era was so mind-numbing). In fact, Saturday Night Live was at one time the standard-bearer of understanding our politicians with Chevy Chase's Gerald Ford and Dana Carvey's George H.W. Bush leading the way.

Other comedic voices led the way in the 1990s--late night talk show hosts. Jay Leno--using Clinton jokes well after his presidency was over--and David Letterman directed our understanding of the Clinton years. The increasing influence of The Daily Show and The Colbert Report have begun doing the same for George W. Bush.

But now, it seems as if something is breaking through the fog: SNL seems to be taking on the establishment that it was too afraid to do for a decade and a half--and in so doing, is revealing the danger of mediocrity.

Tina Fey's Sarah Palin is hilarious, and the truly standout performance, with true witty, blatant gags for laughs, with truly subtle undertones of Palin's behavior, revealing the world what all the blather so eagerly overlooks: her intentions to be unqualified and to game the system.

But as you watch the video, make sure you watch Amy Poehler's terrifically understated Katie Couric--representing not just the opposite of the flambouyantly bubbly Palin--but portraying a journalist that can't figure out what to do with Palin; doesn't know how to deal with gibberish; doesn't know how to confront a sitting duck; doesn't know how to reveal truth in the midst of incompetance--perhaps only hoping that other people recognize what she sees.

This short skit reveals the political moment with such clarity (and of course, humor) and such beauty, it actually brings both shame to this industry of the exclusive interview and hope for the political process. It reveals the truth about a craven politician and an innept corporate media in a way that know 'hard hitting expose' or New York Times article ever could.

And it kind of makes me want to watch SNL for the first time in a decade.

I'm tired of the 'spin' spin

2008-09-25T13:06:00.001-04:00

It is getting pretty ridiculous when we can claim innocence for blatant lies by suggesting that we intended (A) but had no idea that (B) might go along with it. That has been the entire defense of Iraq, the Swiftboat attacks in 2004 against Sen. John Kerry and seems to be Sen. John McCain's entire platform.

So that's what comes to mind when I heard this incredible news: that a shadow group is sending out DVDs through the New York Times that are a racist, anti-Islam documentary. According to Ali Gharib, these DVDs will reach 28 million Americans and the company that produced them, the Clarion group, suggests that they aren't trying to influence the election.

I'm sorry, but what else are you doing just over a month before the election, by sending out vile fear-mongering? What else is there than that? Are you next going to claim that it is coincidental that the DVD's subject mirrors some of the more disturbing elements of John McCain's platform?

It is funny, that the same week that McCain trashes the paper for being "in the tank" for Obama, they would except money for an "advertisement" of this sort. It is funny that McCain is trying to play the refs when the refs aren't even paying close enough attention to how they are being played by anybody. Oh, what craziness is this?

McCain's "base" no longer sharing the love

2008-09-24T15:02:00.001-04:00

I found this today with the best headline ever: "Press Frustration With McCain Bubbles Over: 'Has Your Bus Become the No Talk Express?'.

We let Bush get away with this in 2000 and continued to let him manipulate the press (he is currently doing it over the $700B bailout). But here is the press finally getting tired of being played. And it just may cost him...

Racism and the Irish?

2008-09-23T11:21:00.001-04:00

This is an interesting note. Senator John McCain has had many different positions on immigration reform, sometimes supporting undocumented workers and other times not. His position was most prominently changed after that recent immigration debate.

So now, the presidential candidate is in favor of giving immigrants a "path to citizenship" (ie. amnesty)...as long as they are Irish.

Irish.

McCain supports the Irish immigrants but no longer supports immigrants from Mexico and Latin America? Are you kidding me? What could possibly be different about immigrants from Ireland and Mexico? Hmmm...

So when can we actually deal with the racist elephant in the living room?

The scourge of the purge

2008-09-23T11:09:00.002-04:00

In Michigan, as elsewhere, we are seeing the further advancement of the election tactic known as purging the voter rolls.

In advance of the 2000 election, the state of Florida passed an incredibly undemocratic law removing the rights of convicted felons to vote. This allowed the secretary of state (remember Katherine Harris?) to purge millions of voters from the rolls. They did it again in 2004, bringing their total purged well over 5 million.

This, as well as the broad discrepencies in exit polls and inconsistencies in many Florida districts brought the nation's attention to election procedures. This, of course, is a good thing. Republicans, however, turned their attention away from fixing the voting problems and turned instead toward caging and purging--two acts intended to bring down the number of people voting. These acts also disenfranchise the poor and the unrepresented in our culture. This action seemed to have the added effect of appearing to be the needed "election reform" that we wanted after watching the 2000 recount. They passed this off as the needed changes (because inconsistent voting machines should be blamed on having too many people voting?).

Now we have this coming to Michigan. This article here outlines the problem. It is illegal to purge voter rolls based on returned mail, and yet, the secretary of state (a Republican) is doing just that.

The problem, as with everything else, is that there is little time to do anything about this through the legal system. Urging Secretary Terri Lynn Land hasn't worked, and we are just over a month from the election. Even if a lawsuit by the ACLU gets a positive result before the election, it stilly may be impossible to get those individuals purged from the list back on it--and state law prevents them from reregistering that close to the election. Not to mention that the only way most of these people will learn that they have been purged from the voter rolls is when they show up to vote.

This is the height of unethical and immoral (not to mention illegal) procedure. True election reform must happen before the 2010 midterm elections, but if the last 8 years are any indication, I don't expect to see that happen. We must have the political will to make it a priority or injustice will be the standard.

Paul Reiser gets it.

2008-09-14T10:14:00.001-04:00

In my last post, I decried McCain as a monster. Here's another way to look at it supplied by Paul Reiser (yes the comedian), posted on the Huffington Post. McCain as the childhood bully.

Adding to this the way the Right frames their discussions, there is a certain blogability to the infantiling of the American people by their Republican "Fathers"...perhaps that's next!

McCain: I’m being an ass because Obama said 'no' to me

2008-09-13T13:38:00.003-04:00

Senator John McCain has revealed himself over the last few months to be something truly different as a presidential candidate. No, not a maverick. I'm talking more like, say, a monster or the political version of a serial rapist. Here's what I'm thinking. McCain has said several times, including in Thursday night’s forum on service that had Sen. Barack Obama agreed to tour the country doing joint town hall meetings, the campaign would have a different tone today. It is an interesting suggestion, and probably half-true, since McCain wouldn’t be an ass with Obama on the stage with him. But this forgets political advertising, the very thing that has set this negative tone. I can’t imagine the Republican National Committee and their surrogate 527s running feel-good ads in any event.

The simple problem with this argument is that McCain is comparing Xs and Os. Apples and oranges. Or better yet, Xs with 4s. Town hall meetings—like any in-person campaign event—is a time of conversation with people. Political advertising, on the other hand, the source of tremendous negative mudslinging by the McCain campaign, are one-sided attacks beamed directly into people’s homes without any opportunity for rebuttal. Doing the former in no way precludes the latter. If Obama and McCain did a town hall meeting every night together, we would still have political ads.

And this leads to the grotesque underside of McCain’s argument: if you examine McCain’s comment from the other perspective you see that he is suggesting that because Obama did not acquiesce, he was forced to attack him viciously with lies and slander. The heart of McCain’s argument is, essentially, “she shouldn’t have worn that dress”. He is saying 'I was forced to become a monster because a) I didn’t get my way and b) Obama was allowed to exercise his own judgment.'

This, more than anything I have seen, exposes the darkness within the heart of McCain. It shows how he deals with failure, disagreement, and disappointment. It shows how cynical he is and how little he trusts others. It demonstrates not only an unwillingness to work with those with which he disagrees, but an unwillingness to deal with them humanely and decently. Like the recent article that encourages us to tilt our understanding of McCain to who he was before he was a POW (a bomber pilot, eager to kill thousands of civilian Vietnamese in collateral damage and direct attacks), the recent weeks have exposed John McCain—and the true monster that resides in his soul.

McCain Campaign: A House of Cards

2008-09-13T00:24:00.000-04:00

The truth of the house of cards is that it always looks sturdy. It looks like a regular house. Or at least like a strangely-patterned one. It looks like it is strong, well-built, and of appropriate significance—until you blown on it, sneeze near it, or say, walk on the floor within a 20 feet of it.

The truth of the Republican smear machine is that they’ve built the McCain-Palin ticket like a house of cards. Our brains tell us to not trust them (for so many reasons, but let’s just say this: hypocrisy), our guts tell us to worry about them, and yet our hearts seem won over by the tails of gallantry, self-sacrifice, and “realness”. At least that’s what most of us are left with. The corporate media feels comfortable pretending as if they play no part in this, even though they spent the entire Democratic convention trying to expose some underground plot by Hillary’s secret army and the entire Republican convention fawning over the supposed “Tina Fey lookalike”. And this week we had the first public interview by Gov. Sarah Palin, which will do more to inspire confidence in the status quo than it will expose Palin’s true character. A letter circulating around the Internet, written by a Wasilla, Alaska native that knows her, is certainly doing a better job of that than Charlie Gibson seems capable of.

In truth, McCain-Palin are offering us very little reason to support them. In fact, in last night’s event, John McCain was asked about the negative tone of the campaign so far, with the moderator stopping short of nailing McCain on setting that tone. McCain then proceeded to put the blame on Obama, as he has over the last week and a half saying “if he had only agreed to the town hall meetings I suggested.” I don’t think I would have gotten away with that at home if I made a mess and blamed it on my sister: who was in the other room at the time. But the worst of it is that McCain actually stated that the way we know how tactics work is the way people vote; that the winning strategy determines future campaign strategies. What McCain all but admits is that he is running an almost entirely negative and schizophrenic campaign this year because a) it worked in the past and b) if it works again, Republicans will use it in 2012.

But here is where the house of cards analogy comes in: the media is obsessed with polls showing McCain and Obama in a dead heat (despite ample reason to doubt the veracity of the polling, especially an over-representation of Republicans polled in the recent batch) and with the Palin and convention bump. At the same time, they are reluctantly reporting on Palin’s baggage and occasionally pointing out one of McCain’s lies. BUT, they seem to be tied to this need to not be seen as picking on McCain, so they have to either tread lightly or makeup a story to run about Obama to “balance” it out. As of today, the corporate media are the unwitting accomplices to McCain’s lie, lie, suck up, and lie some more strategy. The pessimists in us want to give up—the corporate media isn’t going to do their jobs…unless they do.

What happens to the McCain campaign when somebody gives him the tough questions and makes him answer them, not with lies or pander (The McCain robot’s seemingly only two settings) but with accountability for what he says and for what those around him say. What happens if reporters are actually allowed access to Palin in the way expected of any other candidate? She’s been in the spotlight for a week and a half and has already lied enough times to fulfill an entire term in the House of Representatives under Tom Delay. What happens when the corporate media actually wakes up? All it would take is the slightest movement and all of the cards come crashing to the table.

Perhaps the most fitting September 11, 2001 tribute

2008-09-11T15:24:00.003-04:00

I still don't like referring to it as "9/11" or simply "September 11th" as it is not a fitting title or descriptor of the day. I'm not sure what to call it, other than perhaps saving the day for a different purpose. Reserving the day for remembering self-sacrifice and help for others is natural, and is already the feeling many have.

But here is something else. Since I'm on a video kick, check out last night's "Special Comment" from Keith Olbermann:

On a day that still is reserved in many people's hearts as a day of frightening realization, and marked off for at least a decade's time as a day in which much of the world slows down, even still, we should be reminded of what it means to be a human being. We should, as we stop and reflect, take the time to be real people, with compassion for others, not political manipulations.

The truth is that Olbermann's defense of 9/11/01's memory is a fitting tribute, better than shooting lights in the sky, glorious speeches about the human condition, or musical tributes. Olbermann defends the day from crass and cynical exploitation. But more than that, he is defending you. He is defending your right to feel outrage and fear and sadness and worry and joy and all of our human emotions without fear of emotional manipulation. To use the horrors of mass murder as a political ploy is as disgusting as it gets. This isn't telling a story that tugs at your heartstrings or framing the issue to your benefit--this is exploiting America's trust on something we all agreed was off-limits. Shame on you, Rudy, John, and Sarah. Shame on you RNC. This is the lowest of the low.

The Real McCain

2008-09-10T16:11:00.001-04:00

For more, visit their website here.

No she can't.

2008-09-10T15:20:00.001-04:00

Another picture I like:

Lie, Lying, Liar

2008-09-10T12:39:00.002-04:00

Lie. It's a good word. We use it to expose more than falsehood. It exposes the root attempt to deceive. We lie because we aren't just spreading an untruth, but we are willfully doing so, directing others' attention to different things.

We use the word lie to expose that root attempt to deceive. We say that someone is lying because we don't want to pull our punches on this: this deception is too big, too important to leave as a "misstatement", "falsehood", or "untruth". It is a lie.

A liar is one who willfully deceives. A liar is a person that is trying to screw you over, swindle, and take from you. A liar is a petty thief or sniveling whelp. A liar is one who is much more than inauthentic, but a boaster and abuser. Liars are unethical and immoral. When we are liars, we are the worst versions of ourselves.

That's why this made my day! It's an article about McCain and why the corporate media seems so reluctant to "Call McCain What He Is: a Liar" as it suggests in its title.

And here's the thing. McCain has become a serial liar of the worst kind: achieving what he can't seem to achieve otherwise. He is the hypocrite that chose mudslinging before he even thought of what his campaign would be about.

The dirty, sick part of McCain, the serial liar, is that it appears to be a strategy. I don't just mean that he is telling "white lies" or that he is "stretching the truth" or using "spin" or any other gentle euphemism for lie. No, I'm talking about willful deception: out-and-out lying. He adopted this stance from the beginning, playing off of the "dottering old man" picture of him that was developing. But first, just think about the last 8 years. Think back to what Governor George W. Bush was saying he would do in the White House and then what he didn't. Think about all of the lies Bush told: about the economy, about terrorism, and yes, about Iraq. Think about Bush's constantly changing reasons for being in Iraq and making claims before he rejects them (and then claims that he never made them in the first place). McCain is inheriting a platform that is based on lies and seems to whole-heartedly embrace an agenda of lying.

Then, we have the lies that are the harmless non-truths. These are the statements that we all make when we've joined the bandwagon late and need to make up for it, so we make zealous remarks about how we feel about it. It's the "hey, I'm the greener candidate" McCain lie. This isn't spin, really. And we don't really want to think of it as an exageration or total lie, right? We just all know that McCain isn't a green candidate, never was, won't be on January 20th, but is using this issue to deceive for political gain. So yeah, McCain really is lying.

Politicians pray that you don't have a long-term memory. They want to say anything today, regardless of yesterday and tomorrow. They want today to be all that matters. Journalists, with their obsession with the "now" story, only feed into that eternal "now". They want today's story to be more important than yesterday's or tomorrow's because they have a scoop.

We are a people of yesterday, today, AND tomorrow. We cannot afford to let lying and other willful deceptions to change our tomorrow, just because everyone seems stuck in today (or last night).

Real Leadership

2008-09-08T16:13:00.004-04:00

I'm not sure where this originates, but I found it on An Inch At A Time here.

Oh, and I'll add this: "True that!"

And that's not all!

2008-09-04T10:44:00.003-04:00

With Bush, it's like shooting fish in a barrell, but this was irresistable. Bush, taking any opportunity to push a radical agenda--regardless of his tonedeafness--suggested that Hurricane Gustav represents the perfect reason for offshore drilling. Huh? As I put it a moment ago, that argument is like suggesting that 1 + 1 = apple.

We recognize that the pre-storm efforts were important, and so is
the follow-up efforts. In other words, what happens after the storm
passes is as important as what happens prior to the storm arriving.

Spoken like one of the people that ignored the need to upgrade the levees prior to 2005. He soon suggests:

There are some encouraging signs. For example, during Katrina, rigs
would be -- rigs moved because of the force of the storms and their
anchors drug across pipelines, which caused there to be infrastructure
damage. We didn't see much of that this time, although I will tell you
that it's a little early to be making any forecasts.

Since there wasn't that much damage to the rigs that are there, we should load up out on the shelf! Now he's making the equation 1 + orange = apple.

One thing is for certain: When Congress comes back, they're got to
understand that we need more domestic energy, not less; that -- and one
place to find it is offshore America, lands that have been -- you know,
have been taken off the book, so to speak, by congressional law. And
now they need to give us a chance to find more oil and gas here at home.

Considering that the industry is currently running at capacity and has well over one hundred unused drilling permits, what we need for getting more oil is handing out more permits! Makes perfect sense to me. While we're at it, let's see if McDonald's can sell more cheeseburgers by authorizing the building of more franchises without the company showing any interest in doing so!

I'd much rather, you know, American consumers be buying gasoline
produced from American oil than from foreign oil. I'd rather our
dollars stay at home than go overseas.

Spoken like a man that hasn't paid any attention to what is going on with his country's labor force for, say, three decades! Yes, who wouldn't rather we be energy independent and using the local resources--but your suggestion here doesn't jive with the calls for drilling you are making. New oil discoveries would lead to production for international consumption, not local. And besides, when did you ever care about maintaining U.S. funds in the hands of its citizens--you ran up ridiculous debt to the Chinese and Saudis.

Actually, this is the paragraph that I find the most insulting, because it is something I whole-heartedly believe and it is something that he doesn't give a rat's behind about. He's just trying to sound positive, dressing up a pig, if you will. That is the height of cyncism and makes Bush the most dispicable man in America (VP Cheney is overseas at the moment).

And, you know, I know the Congress has been on recess for a while,
but this issue hadn't gone away. And this storm should not cause the
members of Congress to say, Well, we don't need to address our energy
independence, it ought to cause the Congress to step up their need to
address our dependence on foreign oil.

Another jab at Congress taking a recess--where they go home to both vacation and meet with their local constituants--by a president that is on vacation over 40% of the time!

And there's the part where he is using tragedy to justify drilling. He's back to 1 + 1 = apple.

And one place to do so is to -- is to give us a chance to explore in
environmentally friendly ways on the outer continental shelf.

There's the coup! He thinks by stating that this hypothetical solution to energy independence that won't touch the current price of gas, and won't have it's potential $0.01 price drop for another 10 years will simply make it happen. But better than that, while its hypothetical and not actual, let's throw on there its direct opposite to make it more palitable! Let's call it an "environmentally friendly" hypothesis. Yes, and clean coal won't still be about burning carbon.

Thank you very much.

No, George, thank you!

Bush compares liberals to torturers

2008-09-04T10:23:00.001-04:00

Yes, the president has finally flipped. Check out this quick blog which posts Bush's speech for the Republican National Convention on Tuesday. In it, Bush claims that

“If the Hanoi Hilton could not break John McCain’s resolve to do what
is best for his country, you can be sure the angry Left never will.”

Yes, that's right. Bush compared the "angry Left" to the North Vietnamese.

I also like Matthew Yglesias's assessment of Bush's often-used trope of believing that liberats are "self-consciously pushing a bad-for-America agenda". When will America turn off his microphone?

Sexism

2008-09-04T10:06:00.003-04:00

The media isn't sexist. Or at least not in the way the candidates think it is.

Gov. Sarah Palin is running on a platform of extremism packaged as "traditional" values. She has the slimmest resume of any candidate in decades, but that isn't the real concern. The biggest concern is her blatant obsession with power.

Prior to her nomination, Palin showed no interest in the pressing issues of the day, especially Iraq, saying "I haven't really focused much on the Iraq war." Instead, she pursues the eradication of medical freedom (her stances on abortion--anti-choice--and stem cell research), scientific freedom (pro-teaching creationism), and sexual freedom (anti sex ed--pro abstinence-only) with the heavy-handed approach of a dictator.

But here is the rub: she portrays herself as a "typical" hockey mom. She invites us to see her, not as the strong, commanding VP (the one that's half a breath away from the Oval Office), but the supportive, dutiful wife. Her entire candidacy is not only based on sexism (let's add a woman to steal women voters away from the other guy), but she is running on a platform of sexism. She doesn't want women to have equal pay with men. She doesn't want women to have a choice in their sexual health or to make appropriate arrangements to prevent unwanted pregnancies. And her approach to the office from day one has been is not one of equality, but of subservience. She embodies sexism.

The charges of sexism leveled against the media are truly ridiculous. The Republicans spent all of yesterday making this allegation--for the media's depiction of Palin as inexperienced. Experience level is not an issue of sexism and they can't have it both ways: you can't claim Obama is inexperienced while saying that same charge against your candidate is out of bounds. Please.

So here it is. The truth. Sexism is about putting the needs of the dominant sex above the needs of the other(s). Sarah Palin represents that same arrangement, not just the status quo, but of the eating away at your rights and libirties. In short, the most sexist person in this campaign is Sarah Palin. And that's just sick.

And don't let her aww-shucks approach fool you--it's won her a lot of support already, regardless of her political positions. She is hungry for power and the ability to tell you what to do (or not do) in your home, your bedroom, and in your community at large.

The real Republican National Convention.

2008-09-03T12:41:00.001-04:00

While there are occasional fireworks inside the hall, the real story is what is going on outside the convention. This is where protesters are being arrested illegally by the city police in conjunction with the FBI. Take a look at one person's account here.

Several of those assaulted and arrested by the police include journalists, including Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!.

Apparently the Republican Party can't handle protests that include peace and poverty rallies, so the police beat people up.

Nice work, McCain!

When is the time?

2008-08-26T14:28:00.001-04:00

Michigan is my home. I have lived (nearly) my whole life in the state. But coming across this article about the fate of Great Lakes water has revealed something to me: that point of no return.

Do you ever wonder what the breaking point is? That point where you may have to call the game on account of rain? Put your hands in the air and say "I've done all I can?" For the United States, the issue of water is so obvious. It's about preservation and sustaining our resources. Full stop. The problem is that other interests come in and try to have some influence. The economic conditions in the Midwest, extraction technologies, and the buying habits of consumers seem to be all vying for more important. Their argument is not just which is more important (comparing apples to oranges), but they argue as if this has to be done. Think about it a second. Instead of dealing with the issues as they are, we pretend as if we can not only ignore those issues, but we can declare them less important than one company's bottom line.

We have been watching it with ANWR for years now, where the argument is framed this way: oil prices are high, so we should drill more. There is oil here and those mean environmentalists won't let us get it. We must stop them from driving our prices up with their foolish crusade to save polar bears. Only one company would get this contract, only a few new jobs would be created, only one or two year's worth of oil is introduced into the world economy, most of which won't appear for a decade. All of this greed and central impact (we would see a whopping $0 price break from this endeavor), with the environmental degredation, habitat destruction, and migratory path decimation are the cost and the people not only receive virtually no economic benefit, we have to pay for the ecological impact.

Great Lakes water is the same. Nestle, Pepsi, or Coke wanting to empty the lakes the way they are stripping aquafirs throughout the world is not only an unsustainable impact, but it is not about Midwesterners and Canadians being mean--its about standing up to what is important. Its about preserving 20% of the world's fresh water as we suck up the rest. There is a very real possibility that in the next few years one of the above companies will be able to raid the Great Lakes as if they had the right to do so. Unless we change are view--they will.

And when that day happens? Well, I've always wanted to spend time in northern Europe.

Damned if you do and if you don't

2008-08-25T11:32:00.001-04:00

Sen. Barack Obama was in a tight spot about his choice of runningmate. The McCain camp was prepared to attack him for picking a liberal or a moderate, an old guy or a young one, a woman or a man, another minority or the white guy. They had all of these in their back pocket and were just waiting for the chance to use them.

To be fair, the public short list (not confirmed by the campaign, so it was all speculation) was three white guys and one white woman. Two of the men were moderates, whose only real appeal was that they were from supposed "swing" states. The woman (Kathleen Sebelius) was the popular governor of Kansas, and the other guy was Sen. Joe Biden.

In reality, the pickings for a VP were slim: Senators John Edwards and Hillary Clinton were out from the start, but for different reasons. Edwards is now too "tainted" by scandal and Clinton typifies the need for change. Regardless of any perceived need to broker a deal, Clinton would compromise Obama's ticket completely. But we've already covered that.

This is the real reason that pickings are slim: there aren't many high-profile Democrats that could help float the ticket. To suggest that Evan Bayh or Tim Kaine have any national reputation is absurd. Neither is a particular darling of the Democratic Party, nor is either particularly appealing to the base. The suggestion that either would work is more of Obama throwing a bone to the establishment than anything else in picking a party loyalist and moderate. Ms. Sebelius, on the other hand, was a truly intriguing pick. She was the second female to become governor of Kansas and provided a stunning upset of a Republican incumbent. She would have served as a truly historic VP choice and her positions would be popular with the base and moderates alike. But perhaps the ticket shouldn't be too historic...

So that really only left Biden. The most capable, recognizable, healthy, appealing option. He represents an Obama-style Democrat in being able to make some compromises for a greater victory, and is as politically mainstream as they come.

So here is the real issue: Biden doesn't "complete" Obama. The media is all over this "shrewd" move by Obama in picking a "balancing force" to the ticket and "shoring up a weakness". They look at it as Obama acknowledging a shortcoming or that he is tired of being beaten up about foreign policy: despite the fact that both Bush and McCain have actually adopted Obama's policy. Biden is another voice.

But the worst charge, which betrays the media's lack of understanding, is that Biden is the "ultimate insider", the current description du jour. Discussing the need for change in Washington as if Washington has always been bad not only misunderstands the argument, but seems to ignore the subtext: the post-Reagan years, and specifically, the Clinton Democrats and Bush Republicans, are the true problem. Biden not only pre-dates Bush and the Clintons, but Reagan as well. When "conventional thinking" is bandied about in this discussion, it isn't everybody in Washington, it is pro-corporate agenda, deregulation, and perpetual tax-cutting that represent the 90's and 00's that is truly at issue. It is the offspring of "trickle down" that need to be kicked out of control. In this way, Biden is more appealing that Clinton, but he is still "tainted", if you will. In this way, Biden represents, not an equal or superior, but an inferior--someone that has made mistakes and has had a lot of time to make those mistakes.

Is Biden the best bick? Of these options, maybe. But he was the only real option. In a world where the media's favorite thing is to find the bright, new, shiny toy and then tear it to pieces, scraping and clawing away, smashing it with a hammer in hopes of opening it up, and then staring at its coveted guts in hopes of gleaning some insight, Obama's pick was going to cause too much criticism. Now let's see if McCain's choice gets a fraction of that criticism.

Check out the 'Blowback'!

2008-08-20T13:03:00.001-04:00

As of this morning, my letter to the editors of the Los Angeles Times was printed on their website, in the "Blowback" section. Take a look at it here.

The gist of it is this: it seems as if the LA Times was attempting to shoehorn the issues of the Anglican Communion into the "Culture War", a one-sided crusade on the part of the Bill O'Reillys of the world to change the way we think. In truth, the church is nowhere near this stuff and the theological and missional discussions of the church shouldn't be relegated to the smut-driven Right-Wing trash-talkers.

Perhaps you should just read the letter yourself!

Bishops return!

2008-08-18T12:04:00.003-04:00

The bishops have returned from Lambeth. The Record, the newspaper for the Diocese of Michigan, conducted an interview with the three bishops of the lower peninsula of Michigan, found here.

I am very hopeful for where the church is in the midst of our economic adversity.

Look at the crazy in the cage!

2008-08-11T11:12:00.000-04:00

Make sure you stare!

After dealing with the media circus surrounding the FBI’s investigation of seemingly Public Enemy #1, Bruce Ivins, it occurred to me that the word circus is less accurate than another place you are likely to see domesticated animals: the zoo.

Evidence linking Ivins to the Anthrax attack in 2001 was circumstantial, which they even admitted, but recent findings have called into question nearly every aspect of the case. Currently, microbiologists have come forward to question 1) the science the FBI used, 2) that Ivins could even process the Anthrax alone, and 3) the FBI’s potential to even isolate the strain so definitively. More response here. At the same time, investigative journalists such as Gerald Posner and Glenn Greenwald have poked tremendous holes in the evidence, including the credibility of the star witness and the credibility of the FBI’s investigation.

Then there are the obvious issues that don’t compute. Either Ivins is a meticulous researcher and devious plotter or he is crazy, depressed, and reckless. Either he is dangerous and needs to be pursued or he is not dangerous and maintains his work with Anthrax. Either this is an open-and-shut-case or there really is nothing there!

Personally, I am less interested in whether or not Bruce Ivins was the “lone mad scientist” or not (though I’m certain he wasn’t based on the evidence) and more interested in the rush to judgment. What is the purpose that has the FBI flooding the news agencies with all of this circumstantial evidence, thereby flooding the public opinion with stories about sorority obsessions and strange e-mails? And what purpose could the FBI have in closing this investigation?

I am reminded of a Hollywood example of this. My wife watches The Closer and I caught the end of the last episode in which the title character uses her fiancé from the FBI to get information so that she could close her case. In so doing, she jeopardized the FBI’s investigation of a much bigger criminal (as well as her relationship). The funny thing in this is that this exposes the criminal investigation agencies’ obsession with closing a case over determining the truth or helping achieve justice. In naming a now dead man as the only operative in an elaborate crime, the FBI will be able to close the case and move on. It doesn’t seem to matter to them that this doesn’t fit. It doesn’t seem to make a difference to them that significant parts of the investigation have all but proved he couldn’t have done that part by himself.

It is almost as if they know they would never get a conviction with this. They hounded him and warned him that he was being investigated. His apparent suicide (conveniently-timed as it is) only adds to the story. It is almost as if they have learned nothing since the JFK assassination and Monica Lewinsky—cover-ups and half-truths have a life of their own. Wouldn’t an honest investigation be more fruitful?

This leads to the primary reason for interest: how easily this is taken and amplified in the media. This case makes a mockery of the FBI, and yet, they are going to continue to get credit for a “win” here. And the people will be able to sleep soundly knowing that a criminal got the ‘sweet justice’ of death. Perhaps it is the half-listening, the partial attention paid by the casual TV news watcher that is the true target, after all. Perhaps the FBI, politicized under Bush as any other agency is in the business of marketing: pitching their product to ignorant consumers. Their technique isn’t just to sway us, as a lawyer sways a jury, but to play off both our ignorance and our laziness. They have put forth a flimsy case with severe inconsistencies knowing half of us won’t get it and the other half won’t even listen.

But it is the media zoo in which they have placed this poor man for millions to ogle that gets me. They’ve put a sign next to his cage that may read something like this.

Bruce is an homosapien, found here in his natural habitat. Notice the contents of his desk, the lab coat, and the vial that was most certainly his murder weapon. He works at Fort Detrick in Maryland and otherwise lives with a wife and adopted children.

It is believed that he is solely responsible for the 2001 Anthrax attacks that resulted in five deaths. Though there isn’t a great deal of definitive evidence against him, he has the crazy eyes, doesn’t he?

Onlookers would no doubt chant "murderer" outside of his cage as they visit to get a glimpse of such a "monster". It is like a car wreck--you have to not only slow down, but go well out of your way to get a glimpse!

Oh, and then there would be note taped to the sign.

Sorry for the inconvenience, but Bruce recently died and his cage is being emptied. We encourage your continued ogling and derision while we take our time in replacing him with another specimen.

What a team the FBI and Big Media make! I’m so glad I live in such a repugnant environment!

Monica is the tip of the iceberg

2008-07-31T11:01:00.002-04:00

Monica Goodling, the person currently at the center of a Congressional investigation in which she used illegal discriminatory practices to stack the Justice Department with pro-Bushies, is as useless as she looks. And that seems to be the point.

A full accounting of her experience can be found here, including her obviously inflated resume. Missing is her law degree from Pat Robertson's Conservative mill, Regent University.

What is insane is that the obvious technique employed by the Bush Administration isn't merely an issue of politicos being placed or 'hired' for positions despite their lack of qualifications (or qualifications that would eliminiate them from consideration, such as defenders of Big Oil in charge of the EPA, for example), it is that they seem to be using every aspect of the administration to build experience for those that cannot earn it. Putting weaker candidates in place doesn't just serve the current administration in compliance, but serves the Republican Party by inflating the number of "experts" that have their ideology.

This concept is dangerous and will have long-term consequences. Look at the example of those political operatives that were deemed failures from the 1970s and weren't involved until their careers were resurrected by Bush I (Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz). Or look at those that were discredited and/or sent to jail after Nixon's administration and the renaissance they are experiencing. At least these people "earned" their positions (AND happened to be crooked). President Bush, on the other hand, gives promotions to loyal followers regardless of credentials, giving his personal lawyer (Alberto Gonzales) the job of Attorney General and initially nominating another of his lawyers (Harriet Miers) to the Supreme Court. Giving his cronies jobs is bad enough, but he is now giving them experience that they can use after he is out of office. The Bush Administration is inflating the statistics to their long-term advantage.

The media already gives liberals and moderates a ridiculous burden of proof unreflective of reality--now put more 'former White House officials' on the street to spread lies and misinformation for the next generation. Chalk it up as yet another poisonous byproduct of Bush's corrupt legacy.

Toby Keith isn't just a racist, he's sick

2008-07-30T17:11:00.001-04:00

It is all too easy to use 'racist' to describe someone. It seems to have lost its meaning. In fact, conservatives are likely to make you think that they no longer exist: that we are all color-blind now.

But here's the truth: racism isn't just alive, its well. Toby Keith has gone on a publicity tour supporting his new album, singing the song "Beer For My Horses on The Colbert Report and will play it on The Tonight Show. The song, among other things, glorifies lynching, the Jim Crow South, and vigilante 'justice' and terrorism.

If you want to read more about it, check out this article here, but I must warn you that its pictures are graphic.

If this is the symbol of patriotism, don't you wish there were another option?

File this under "absurd"

2008-07-30T17:01:00.001-04:00

Yeah, weddings get so out of hand, that police have to taser the groom all the time.

Check out the lunacy and overreaction here.

A reflection on two worldviews

2008-07-30T16:30:00.002-04:00

In light of Lambeth, GAFCON, and all of the media’s attempts to dismantle the positive conversation that is currently going on within the Anglican Communion, as well as the Archbishop’s address yesterday, a thought occurred to me recently.

The current talk of schism (encouraged by the self-called Global South, cranky American bishops, and the reporters that amount to teenagers in a schoolyard chanting “Fight! Fight!
Fight!”) leads to the embodiment of two incredibly questionable worldviews:

There are two groups that are warring in any situation.
Conservatives are in a culture war.

Neither of these worldviews is accurate, nor are they beneficial to the discussion. But we use
them as the subtext, pretext, or even primary text of our discussion.

The war worldview is obviously unhealthy. It begins by suggesting that there are only two views of a situation and that they are diametrically opposed to one-another. It then attempts to shoehorn divergent perspectives into these two opposing positions. Our current political use of liberal and conservative don’t seem to fit the modern definitions or the classical definitions, so why would they even accurately describe the current situation?

Like church conflicts of old, the groups of people that are responsible are not diametrically opposed, but tangentially. Imagine that you are sitting in front of a sandbox. The oppositional/conflict worldview suggests that the other child playing in the sandbox must be directly across from you and that they are in direct opposition to you. What if the other child is to your side, or worse, next to you? Does that mean you have to knock down their castle to make room for your own? Can’t you work on the same greater project?

The second worldview is perhaps more subtle, but strangely common. It is the idea of the culture war: a crusade to remake culture into a conservative ideal. It suggests that the world has strayed, not just from God’s plan, but because of liberalism. Related to the us vs. them mentality described above, this represents the opposing forces from the victim’s perspective. It recasts normal as liberal and conservative as normal. This not only shifts the goal posts, but the sidelines as well!

We have seen this worldview engaged in national politics, introduced in the 70’s, epitomized in the 80’s, and then implemented as normal in the 1990s. It represents a retro response to what they perceive as a creeping liberalism. A liberalism that is also authoritarian. It believes that they have been stripped of their position by those at the top, despite their interest in replacing the existing status with a new centralized conservative authority!

This worldview is further made difficult in that, as in war, both sides are seemingly “responsible” for the current arrangement. It seems to suggest that the culture itself represents hostility toward them and that a chosen action is not a breeching of covenant, but a response to aggressive action. The Schismatics seem to have learned from the Southern rebels that have inherited their region’s legacy after the Civil War.

Both of these worldviews distract us from the discussion that would enliven our relationship, replacing it with conflict, distrust, and in some cases, violence and oppression. Think about this: In confirming the election of V. Gene Robinson to Bishop of New Hampshire, the Episcopal Church didn’t “act”. It abided by its process. The incursion of international bishops into
the Episcopal Church, on the other hand, are acts of aggression.

Until we sit together in honesty and integrity, these things will continue to divide us.

Lambeth update

2008-07-29T17:29:00.001-04:00

For those that are interested, the second week of the Lambeth Conference got off to a lively start. On Monday was the release of the final recommendations of the Windsor Continuation Group. Not surprisingly, these recommendations are clearly the wrong move for the Anglican Communion, and heavily weighted against the Episcopal Church. For a great summary, check out Susan Russell's reaction here.

The Archbishop made an "unscheduled" address to the conference today, which actually seems reasonable...Susan Russell also has the address in full here.

What makes a monster?

2008-07-29T13:22:00.001-04:00

Who bears responsibility for hate? For years, culture warriors went after "devil" music and D&D because they thought it taught children to worship Satan. They went after goth and industrial music and The Matrix after Columbine. They even went after condoms because they thought it might lead to teens having sex. For the culture warriors, bad influencers must be silenced...forever.

The hate-mongers (pick a time and flick on Fox News) that pervade our media: Hannity, O'Reilly, Limbaugh, Savage, Coulter, Beck, etc.: have daily TV, radio, internet, and print opportunities to send the world into a tizzy over the latest thing that "the liberals" have done. Some have all but called for round up and lynching of anyone that professes a liberal position. The very notion that these people are "culture warriors" puts this at the forefront of their thinking.

So what happens when a mass murderer is found to have been influenced by these people? There is a fascinating commentary from The Huffington Post by RJ Eskow that you can find here.

Eskow is interested in the human part: the part that wonders how these people can spew such hate and not feel responsible. I think its time that we stop firing hate-mongers, only to have them reappear after the furor over their latest diatribe ends. How do these people have jobs? How do they get chances to speak in public?

And if we are to consider them entertainers, then why are they on Fox News, hosting news broadcasts, and having articles printed in newspapers? I would expect that more qualified, articulate, and compassionate people could be found...virtually anywhere. Perhaps a random person off the street could be just as entertaining on the nightly news.

Flushing Democracy

2008-07-24T12:51:00.004-04:00

Woooooossssshhhhh!

gurgle

You know when you flush your toilet? You hear that sound of the bowl filling and then draining, then that short pause as the water escapes down the drain, leading to the usual last little gurgle of the water settling. For us, that is the sign that the toilet has officially flushed.

Our country has just heard that gurgle.

The Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit ruled 5-4 on July 15th that the federal government has the right to detain anyone (including citizens and legal residents) indefinitely, without a trial, AND with the government’s ability to label someone an ‘enemy combatant’ without determining proof that the individual has taken direct or even indirect violent or military action against the United States.

gurgle

We’ve been listening to the flushing sound ever since September 12^th, 2001. When the Supreme Court ruled that habeas corpus extends to Guantanemo Bay, we heard that moment of silence. Then this gurgle. But I’ll give you a second to let the above sink in.

According to this ruling, described in an article for Alternet, which includes acknowledgments from the majority opinion, the U.S. government has the right to claim any person at any time anywhere an ‘enemy combatant’, and despite the oldest rule of modern law (habeas corpus), detain that person in isolation indefinitely. The separation between this and Pinochet’s Chile is now gone.

Since 2002 and the declared War on Terror, we have gone back and forth about terms and about concepts. We avoided using the term Prisoner of War because that would require our following the Geneva Convention. We were told that ‘enemy combatants’ are synonymous in the “good” ways, but afford us more “freedom” in handling prisoners. Yeah, right. We made up the term ‘enemy combatant’ as a means of treating American citizens and legal residents as if they had plotted and implemented 9/11.

We also argued that the concept of ‘enemy combatants’ was, like prisoners of war, determined by the length of the conflict. “We have to hold these people so that they don’t rejoin the fighting” they argued. Except that we are in the midst of one of the longest armed conflicts in U.S. history, and one that Attorney General Mukasey is looking to extend indefinitely and without direction (a new request for authorization for military action anywhere at any time is coming before Congress right now). We were promised that ‘enemy combatants’ wouldn’t be held but for a couple of years, only as long as a) useful intelligence could be gathered and b) the couple of years we would be fighting. Now we are looking at a permanent legal black hole in which the president might shove dissenters.

We used to be afraid of new McCarthyism. But McCarthy was an angry man demanding his way. What if we greased the wheels and cleared the tracks for the next one? What happens when we hand over the keys to the kingdom for miniscule hypothetical and potential benefit?

Here’s a reminder course:

The Suspension Clause:

“The privilege of the writ of habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.”

The Due Process Clause:

in Fifth Amendment:

“No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.”

and Fourteenth Amendment:
(from Section 1)

“No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

Not to mention these other areas, also affected:

The Fourth Amendment:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

The Sixth Amendment:

“In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district where in the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.”

And the Eighth Amendment:

“Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”

The person on trial, Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, was entering grad school in 2001. He was arrested and in 2003, was labeled an enemy combatant and locked up in solitary confinement where he was tortured repeatedly and has yet to be relieved from “harsh interrogation” despite military urgings. He has a wife and five children that haven’t seen him in seven years.

The following is an excerpt from the dissenting opinion, authored by Judge Diana Gribbon Motz:

"To sanction such presidential authority to order the military to seize and indefinitely detain civilians, even if the President call them 'enemy combatants,' would have disastrous consequences for the Constitution -- and the country…For a court to uphold a claim to such extraordinary power would do more than render lifeless the Suspension Clause, the Due Process Clause, and the rights to criminal process in the Fourth, Fifth, Sixth and Eighth Amendments; it would effectively undermine all of the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. It is that power -- were a court to recognize it -- that could lead all our laws 'to go unexecuted, and the government itself to go to pieces.' We refuse to recognize a claim to power that would so alter the constitutional foundations of our Republic."

God save us.

The Sudanese statement

2008-07-23T17:06:00.004-04:00

The Archbishop of Sudan, The Most Revd Dr Daniel Deng Bul, made some hay yesterday by denouncing the Episcopal Church and Bp. Robinson (New Hampshire) at a press conference. Earlier, in a press release posted on Anglican Mainstream, a conservative blog, the Archbishop articulated virtually the same position (excerpted without introduction):

In view of the present tensions and divisions within the Anglican Communion, and out of deep concern for the unity of the Church, we consider it important to express clearly the position of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan (ECS) concerning human sexuality.

This is coming out of the context of and from within the midst of Indaba, the listening process that is the central piece of this decade’s Lambeth Conference. As it has been suggested, instead of bringing suitcases of position papers on the subject of human sexuality, the bishops are to participate in a listening process where all are given the opportunity to speak and be heard. As we have seen from similar opportunities, such as Truth and Reconciliation in South Africa, this process can work—if we are willing to participate.

We believe that God created humankind in his own image; male and female he created them for the continuation of humankind on earth. Women and men were created as God’s agents and stewards on earth.

Fair enough, though I'm hearing a but...

We believe that human sexuality is God’s gift to human beings which is rightly ordered only when expressed within the life-long commitment of marriage between one man and one woman.

So what do we do with those that aggressively go beyond these boundaries? Isn’t rape worse than adultery? Where is the moral outrage over the use of rape in Darfur?

We require all those in the ministry of the Church to live according to this standard and cannot accept church leaders whose practice is contrary to this.

Clearly, homosexuality is worse. I’m sorry. It just took me some convincing. You are completely right.

We reject homosexual practice as contrary to biblical teaching and can accept no place for it within ECS.

Your prerogative. Short-sighted, but yours.

We strongly oppose developments within the Anglican Church in the USA and Canada in consecrating a practicing homosexual as bishop and in approving a rite for the blessing of same-sex relationships.

I’ll skip over the slight inaccuracy, but suggest that, like the above prerogative, he has every right to take this stance. I strongly oppose his position. There, we’re square!

This has not only caused deep divisions within the Anglican Communion but it has seriously harmed the Church’s witness in Africa and elsewhere, opening the church to ridicule and damaging its credibility in a multi-religious environment.

Ah! There we are! The ‘gay marriage hurts my marriage’ argument writ large! What I find funny is that this brouhaha was back in 2003. TWO THOUSAND THREE! You’ve made it the story for five years. You would not be on the receiving end of ridicule if "the Global South" didn’t spend every waking hour trying to tell us that we’re heretics and that we are responsible for their position. Last I checked, the damage to the Anglican Communion is by the people threatening to break the Communion, not the ones playing nice over here.

The unity of the Anglican Communion is of profound significance to us as an expression of our unity within the Body of Christ. It is not something we can treat lightly or allow to be fractured easily. Our unity expresses the essential truth of the Gospel that in Christ we are united across different tribes, cultures and nationalities. We have come to attend the Lambeth Conference, despite the decision of others to stay away, to appeal to the whole Anglican Communion to uphold our unity and to take the necessary steps to safeguard the precious unity of the Church.

He almost got there. We were on the same page up until the “uphold our unity and to take the necessary steps to safeguard”. Unity is not about ‘steps taken’ to keep jerks from breaking the communal toys, but in gathering together without regard for differences.

Out of love for our brothers and sisters in Christ, we appeal to the Anglican Church in the USA and Canada, to demonstrate real commitment to the requests arising from the Windsor process. In particular:
- To refrain from ordaining practicing homosexuals as bishops or
priests
- To refrain from approving rites of blessing for same-sex relationships
- To cease court actions with immediate effect;
- To comply with Resolution 1:10 of the 1998 Lambeth Conference
- To respect the authority of the Bible

I normally don’t take kindly to demands, especially in light of hostage-taking scenarios such as this, but I will say that aside from #3, all of these have already been promised or are in place. Let me repeat that: four out of the five demands were already agreed upon by the House of Bishops. This extra demand has nothing to do with maintaining “unity” or in “safeguarding” our Communion, but is an attempt to strengthen splinter groups, eroding the influence of the Episcopal Church, and supporting of extracanonical excursions into the United States in the form of unconscionable breaches into the U.S. church. This is not a demand that can be supported by any party and is a clear slap in the face of anyone who actually believes in the word “unity”.

We believe that such steps are essential for bridging the divisions which have opened up within the Communion.

Clearly laying them out as demands.

We affirm our commitment to uphold the four instruments of communion of the Anglican Communion: the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lambeth Conference, the Primates’ Meeting and the Anglican Consultative Council; and call upon all Provinces of the Communion to respect these for the sake of the unity and well-being of the Church.

As do I, though Lambeth and the ACC are the only two actual pieces with any real weight, but I digress. I couldn’t agree more. So you will stop supporting the hijacking of U.S. and Canadian churches? That is part of the agreement and Windsor process, after all; plus the strong request of the Archbishop of Canterbury.

We appeal to this Lambeth Conference to rescue the Anglican Communion from being divided.

Funny, the onus isn’t on the ones acting in this situation, but on the assembled body of bishops. Now that’s classy!

We pray that God will heal us from the spirit of division. We pray for God’s strength and wisdom so that we might be built up in unity as the Body of Christ.

Amen.

The Most Revd Dr Daniel Deng Bul
Archbishop and Primate of the Episcopal Church of the Sudan and
Bishop of Juba

I included this because the Archbishop is the only signatory, but is speaking on behalf of all of his bishops. Perhaps the gentle reminder that this is Lambeth, a conference of all bishops, and that digging into party lines goes against the spirit of “unity” that is needed here…