Why is bad meat cheap?

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

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?

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.

1. 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.
2. 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.
3. 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...

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

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

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

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?