Forged letters to congressman anger local groups | Charlottesville Daily Progress
Fascinating. Not only because it shows that some lobbyists have absolutely no ethics. More interesting is that the forgeries were attributed to black and Latino groups. I don't know the makeup of Parriello's district, nor does this article identify his party - but he is a Democrat, and so blacks and Latinos must make up a significant part of his constituency. These letters are targeted fraud. Someone should go to jail for this.
BLOG POSTS
Friday, July 31, 2009
MORE EVIDENCE
Want more evidence that the South and the North don't belong in the same nation? Try this from the Huffpo:
New polling by Research 2000 shows that in the South, and including Republicans, Democrats and Independents, only 47% believe Obama was born in America. In the northeast and midwest, the percentage is over 90%.
What this shows is not just a difference in opinion but a difference in thinking process (greatly affected by preconceptions), and definitely a difference in what is considered reliable source material. This could be reflective of the history in race problems in the south - except the north has had plenty of the same. More likely it is reflective of resistance to change. Apparently the south is still a lot more insular than southerners like to let on. It may also be that what passes for urban society in the south, with a few exceptions, is really just a rural society gathered in larger numbers in one place.
Anyway, the north and south seem to be fundamentally different - very little less different than they were 150 years ago - and it's perfectly understandable that neither comprehends how the other thinks.
What bolsters the south now - and did the opposite in the 1850's and 60's - is that the south has greater population growth than the north. There are a lot of reasons to move south - weather, labor conditions, the discovery that you don't culturally belong in the north. There are good reasons not to go there, too. These poll results show those clearly.
New polling by Research 2000 shows that in the South, and including Republicans, Democrats and Independents, only 47% believe Obama was born in America. In the northeast and midwest, the percentage is over 90%.
What this shows is not just a difference in opinion but a difference in thinking process (greatly affected by preconceptions), and definitely a difference in what is considered reliable source material. This could be reflective of the history in race problems in the south - except the north has had plenty of the same. More likely it is reflective of resistance to change. Apparently the south is still a lot more insular than southerners like to let on. It may also be that what passes for urban society in the south, with a few exceptions, is really just a rural society gathered in larger numbers in one place.
Anyway, the north and south seem to be fundamentally different - very little less different than they were 150 years ago - and it's perfectly understandable that neither comprehends how the other thinks.
What bolsters the south now - and did the opposite in the 1850's and 60's - is that the south has greater population growth than the north. There are a lot of reasons to move south - weather, labor conditions, the discovery that you don't culturally belong in the north. There are good reasons not to go there, too. These poll results show those clearly.
Doctor Self-Referrals Part of Health-Care Cost Trend - washingtonpost.com
Doctor Self-Referrals Part of Health-Care Cost Trend - washingtonpost.com
You can't fix health care when everyone sees it as a chance to get rich off misery.
You can't fix health care when everyone sees it as a chance to get rich off misery.
A GOOD THING?
Maybe the fact that there will be no health care bill before the recess is a good thing.
Although it would have been helpful if Congress had fixed language to take back to their constituents and find out what they think of it, this way they can poll a number of options and find out what their voters actually want.
Advertising over the next month will be critical in shaping public opinion. You can hardly blame a Blue Dog for voting against the public option if their constituents hate it. You have to make them love it to get the Blue Dog vote.
Of course, that assumes congressmen will do what their voters want them to. If they're beholden to corporate interests, that's whose interests they'll protect - counting on corporate ads to convince voters not to throw them out in the next election. That's why district by district polling will be critical in August - and the only way to know who these congressmen obey.
I hope Nate is taking care of that.
Although it would have been helpful if Congress had fixed language to take back to their constituents and find out what they think of it, this way they can poll a number of options and find out what their voters actually want.
Advertising over the next month will be critical in shaping public opinion. You can hardly blame a Blue Dog for voting against the public option if their constituents hate it. You have to make them love it to get the Blue Dog vote.
Of course, that assumes congressmen will do what their voters want them to. If they're beholden to corporate interests, that's whose interests they'll protect - counting on corporate ads to convince voters not to throw them out in the next election. That's why district by district polling will be critical in August - and the only way to know who these congressmen obey.
I hope Nate is taking care of that.
Thursday, July 30, 2009
Dobbs' Ratings Take A Hit Over "Birther" Controversy
Dobbs' Ratings Take A Hit Over "Birther" Controversy
The argument has always been that crazy stuff is good for ratings. So let's see what Dobbs does now.
The argument has always been that crazy stuff is good for ratings. So let's see what Dobbs does now.
ANYTHING NEW HERE?
So we have the birthers, the deathers, Obama hates white people, etc. Have we seen this before? Of course.
From day one of Clinton's first term, he was attacked in endless ways, some of which were directed at his policies and some of which were directed at his personal destruction.
There are only two differences between then and now: they couldn't use race against Clinton, and they don't control Congress. If and when they do - and they probably will during Obama's term - you can expect Obama will be impeached.
Only a mass movement - an aggressive one - can put an end to this kind of politics. I guess we thought we'd done that in the 2008 election. Now that I think of it, there's actually no way to stop it. Even if there were no Republicans in Congress, there'd be Limbaugh and Beck, Savage, Levin.
The one thing we haven't seen yet is antisemitism. If it's pointed out that almost all of Obama's staff is white, they could respond that they aren't white, they're Jewish. Won't get that from Savage (born Weiner) and Levin, but the others ..,,? Logic pre Christian Zionists would dictate that it would follow.
From day one of Clinton's first term, he was attacked in endless ways, some of which were directed at his policies and some of which were directed at his personal destruction.
There are only two differences between then and now: they couldn't use race against Clinton, and they don't control Congress. If and when they do - and they probably will during Obama's term - you can expect Obama will be impeached.
Only a mass movement - an aggressive one - can put an end to this kind of politics. I guess we thought we'd done that in the 2008 election. Now that I think of it, there's actually no way to stop it. Even if there were no Republicans in Congress, there'd be Limbaugh and Beck, Savage, Levin.
The one thing we haven't seen yet is antisemitism. If it's pointed out that almost all of Obama's staff is white, they could respond that they aren't white, they're Jewish. Won't get that from Savage (born Weiner) and Levin, but the others ..,,? Logic pre Christian Zionists would dictate that it would follow.
Two Georgia Officers Accused Of Running Criminal Check On Obama
Two Georgia Officers Accused Of Running Criminal Check On Obama
Racist cops? Never heard of it.
The clock is running backwards, folks. Pretty soon we'll be seeing MLK on that balcony in Memphis.
Racist cops? Never heard of it.
The clock is running backwards, folks. Pretty soon we'll be seeing MLK on that balcony in Memphis.
Sarah Palin, Radio Star? Ex-Governor May Be Seeking Radio Deal
Sarah Palin, Radio Star? Ex-Governor May Be Seeking Radio Deal
Exactly who could be surprised by this? But thank you Clear Channel.
Exactly who could be surprised by this? But thank you Clear Channel.
Disorderly Conduct: Conversation About Gates Arrest Precedes Arrest
Disorderly Conduct: Conversation About Gates Arrest Precedes Arrest
Another one. Where did we get the idea that anything had changed since the '60's?
Another one. Where did we get the idea that anything had changed since the '60's?
Wednesday, July 29, 2009
Goldman Sachs Staffer Is Charged With Soliciting Girl (Update1) - Bloomberg.com
Goldman Sachs Staffer Is Charged With Soliciting Girl (Update1) - Bloomberg.com
I'm just shocked. Really. I am.
I'm just shocked. Really. I am.
THE LOW ROAD TO HELL
Tonight Rachel Maddow showed a number of clips of Republicans calling Obama a racist who hates white people. This is beyond absurd. It's incendiary.
I've been saying for a long time that we are seeing the beginnings of a move toward another Civil War between the South and the North. Up to now that's been more or less a rhetorical argument - for example, I mentioned women's and gay rights as the equivalent issues now as slavery was back then.
But now it's reverting to the actual arguments made at the time of the first Civil War and even more clearly during the Reconstruction Period. The sheen of the "New South" has been peeled away; they are proving themselves to be what they have always been. Not enough Republicans have repudiated this stuff, which comes from Limbaugh, Beck and a number of congresspeople. Here's one who at least tried:
I hope it is true, as it has been said, that the new generations have no racism in them. Because if not, we are on the low road to hell.
And if it comes to a breakup, I'll say it again: Please, Mr. President. This time, let them go. It's starting to look like Lincoln didn't do us any favors. Not to mention fighting a bloody war for what turns out to be nothing.
I've been saying for a long time that we are seeing the beginnings of a move toward another Civil War between the South and the North. Up to now that's been more or less a rhetorical argument - for example, I mentioned women's and gay rights as the equivalent issues now as slavery was back then.
But now it's reverting to the actual arguments made at the time of the first Civil War and even more clearly during the Reconstruction Period. The sheen of the "New South" has been peeled away; they are proving themselves to be what they have always been. Not enough Republicans have repudiated this stuff, which comes from Limbaugh, Beck and a number of congresspeople. Here's one who at least tried:
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
I hope it is true, as it has been said, that the new generations have no racism in them. Because if not, we are on the low road to hell.
And if it comes to a breakup, I'll say it again: Please, Mr. President. This time, let them go. It's starting to look like Lincoln didn't do us any favors. Not to mention fighting a bloody war for what turns out to be nothing.
THREE THINGS
If there is going to be meaningful health care reform, three big things are going to have to happen in August. And they are all things Obama once did very well.
1) there is going to have to be a massive ad campaign making very clear what is going to happen and what is not. The Republican plan is the usual one: creating confusion and doubt to erode support. Every lie they tell must be directly countered.
2) the insurance industry must be attacked with facts. This can't be subtle; it must be direct and aggressive. And people in Congress who oppose health care must be exposed.
3) after these are run for a few weeks, Obama has to put it all together in an aggressive attack against tactics like birthers and deathers. The opposition has to be shown as crazed and disingenuous. A heavy dose of ridicule is sbsolutely necessary, combined with a clear prediction of how much better life will be with health care reform. Sense must counter nonsense - big time.
1) there is going to have to be a massive ad campaign making very clear what is going to happen and what is not. The Republican plan is the usual one: creating confusion and doubt to erode support. Every lie they tell must be directly countered.
2) the insurance industry must be attacked with facts. This can't be subtle; it must be direct and aggressive. And people in Congress who oppose health care must be exposed.
3) after these are run for a few weeks, Obama has to put it all together in an aggressive attack against tactics like birthers and deathers. The opposition has to be shown as crazed and disingenuous. A heavy dose of ridicule is sbsolutely necessary, combined with a clear prediction of how much better life will be with health care reform. Sense must counter nonsense - big time.
NO CHIPPING
Obama's Organizing for America is asking me to chip in $1 a day "until we pass real health insurance reform." But I can't do that, because I don't know what Obama thinks real health insurance reform is. And that's why health care reform is in trouble right now. Howard Dean points out that it isn't health insurance reform, but health care reform, that's needed. I don't like Obama's use of the former term.
If Obama is serious about getting something done, it's time that he stopped relying on the Congressional bill-drafting process - in which directly conflicting bills are going to come out of committees in both houses - and told us what HE thinks we need. Until I hear the answer, I don't chip in.
If Obama is serious about getting something done, it's time that he stopped relying on the Congressional bill-drafting process - in which directly conflicting bills are going to come out of committees in both houses - and told us what HE thinks we need. Until I hear the answer, I don't chip in.
TABLOID NATION
When reality shows took over TV, I thought America was headed for a cultural collapse. But I had no idea it would get this bad.
America has become a tabloid nation. Most of what it is presented with to think about is aimed at titillation, outrage, worship of the wrong people for terrible reasons, and the stirring up of contempt and hate. In the political arena, the problem is that politicians are no longer statesmen, and are no longer expected to speak truth or make sense. They are now celebrities, judged by the same standards as any Hollywood type with a PR agent wants to be judged by.
A tabloid nation is a banana republic by definition. A banana republic is one in which the public plays no meaningful part; the country is run by a small oligarchy without regard to anyone outside their circle. The public can be forced into that position, or choose it voluntarily. The latter is what's happening here - not that they're not getting plenty of help from the people who run the place, and have designed our tabloid universe.
When the public no longer can discern what's meaningful or true, and only resonates to tabloid thinking, they abdicate any real role, even if they think they've got one. That's one way to get to banana republic status.
America has become a tabloid nation. Most of what it is presented with to think about is aimed at titillation, outrage, worship of the wrong people for terrible reasons, and the stirring up of contempt and hate. In the political arena, the problem is that politicians are no longer statesmen, and are no longer expected to speak truth or make sense. They are now celebrities, judged by the same standards as any Hollywood type with a PR agent wants to be judged by.
A tabloid nation is a banana republic by definition. A banana republic is one in which the public plays no meaningful part; the country is run by a small oligarchy without regard to anyone outside their circle. The public can be forced into that position, or choose it voluntarily. The latter is what's happening here - not that they're not getting plenty of help from the people who run the place, and have designed our tabloid universe.
When the public no longer can discern what's meaningful or true, and only resonates to tabloid thinking, they abdicate any real role, even if they think they've got one. That's one way to get to banana republic status.
Obama's Doctor: President's Vision For Health Care Bound To Fail
Obama's Doctor: President's Vision For Health Care Bound To Fail
A doc for single payer. Bless his heart!
A doc for single payer. Bless his heart!
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
JUST DUMB
Last night on the O'Reilly Factor, Bill turned to the audience letters. From Peter in Canada: "Has anyone noted that life expectancy in Canada under our health system is higher than the USA?"
Bill: "Well Peter, that's to be expected, we have ten times as many people as you do!"
I have puzzled over this statistical conceit for the past hour. I have finally concluded that O'Reilly is just stupid.
Bill: "Well Peter, that's to be expected, we have ten times as many people as you do!"
I have puzzled over this statistical conceit for the past hour. I have finally concluded that O'Reilly is just stupid.
UNBELIEVABLE
This is what Bill Kristol told Jon Stewart:
The American public do not deserve the same quality health care as our soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan deserve ...
I don't know, Bill - don't you think it's kind of a waste, giving that really good health care to people who are probably going to get killed out there anyway? Why not give that really good health care to people who really deserve it, who really make a difference in America? Like, how about all the guys and gals at Goldman Sachs?
This is for you, Jonathan, who told me how brilliant Kristol is.
The American public do not deserve the same quality health care as our soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan deserve ...
I don't know, Bill - don't you think it's kind of a waste, giving that really good health care to people who are probably going to get killed out there anyway? Why not give that really good health care to people who really deserve it, who really make a difference in America? Like, how about all the guys and gals at Goldman Sachs?
This is for you, Jonathan, who told me how brilliant Kristol is.
NO CHANCE
The key to knowing whether there will be meaningful health care reform is in knowing public opinion in Blue Dog states. Has there been any polling there? If so, and if public opinion is in favor of, say, a public option, is it reasonable to assume that heavy advertising in those states can move the Blue Dogs?
I frankly doubt it. Like all incumbents, they are much more aligned with what their money wants than what their voters want. And it's very possible that their voters want what their money wants.
So I don't see any chance for meaningful health care reform.
I frankly doubt it. Like all incumbents, they are much more aligned with what their money wants than what their voters want. And it's very possible that their voters want what their money wants.
So I don't see any chance for meaningful health care reform.
BEYOND BELIEF
So the Senate approaches health care reform by putting the process into the Senate Finance Committee to arrive at a bipartisan bill. The absurdity of this is palpable. If you need Republican votes to get health care reform, the reform you get is going to be next to worthless.
They are excluding the requirement that large businesses offer coverage to their workers. And they are dropping the public option, which is supported by nearly 70% of Americans. Instead they're including a "nonprofit cooperative" to sell insurance in competition with private industry. Which raises two questions: who is going to stop this "cooperative" from colluding with the carriers - and how are they going to reduce prices when they're selling precisely the same product the carriers are? We're supposed to believe they're going to get the carriers to charge less when the coop sells a policy than when the carrier does? This is so dumb it makes your head spin. Shades of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
They are going to put a 35% tax on high-cost insurance policies, the ones that actually do something when you get sick. This is supposed to rein in costs, but it does absolutely nothing towards that. What it does is force people to buy the cheaper policies that don't do a goddamn thing.
The bill does bar insurers from denying coverage to applicants or charge higher premiums for pre-existing conditions. All this means is that the insurers get more customers. What they do to those customers remains in their hands.
This bill is heavily supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Phrma, which should tell you everything you need to know about it.
The senators putting this together are from Montana, Iowa, North Dakota, New Mexico, Maine and Wyoming. Anybody notice anything missing? Like anyone from a state with actual population and large numbers of uninsured?
They are excluding the requirement that large businesses offer coverage to their workers. And they are dropping the public option, which is supported by nearly 70% of Americans. Instead they're including a "nonprofit cooperative" to sell insurance in competition with private industry. Which raises two questions: who is going to stop this "cooperative" from colluding with the carriers - and how are they going to reduce prices when they're selling precisely the same product the carriers are? We're supposed to believe they're going to get the carriers to charge less when the coop sells a policy than when the carrier does? This is so dumb it makes your head spin. Shades of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
They are going to put a 35% tax on high-cost insurance policies, the ones that actually do something when you get sick. This is supposed to rein in costs, but it does absolutely nothing towards that. What it does is force people to buy the cheaper policies that don't do a goddamn thing.
The bill does bar insurers from denying coverage to applicants or charge higher premiums for pre-existing conditions. All this means is that the insurers get more customers. What they do to those customers remains in their hands.
This bill is heavily supported by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Phrma, which should tell you everything you need to know about it.
The senators putting this together are from Montana, Iowa, North Dakota, New Mexico, Maine and Wyoming. Anybody notice anything missing? Like anyone from a state with actual population and large numbers of uninsured?
MY NEXT BOOK
The title of my next book is going to be "Puppies, Babies and Michael Jackson: Is Obama American?". I figure this will sell a lot more copies than my alternate title, which was "Farm Animals, Teleportation and Friedrich Engels: Are Republicans Sane?"
Monday, July 27, 2009
FATWAS
Now we find out that John Yoo, besides writing the "legal memorandum" which okayed the Bush torture program, wrote another one which okayed Cheney's sending Federal troops to Buffalo to arrest some alleged terrorists - in contravention of the 1878 posse comitatus act which generally prohibits federal military personnel and units of the National Guard under federal authority from acting in a law enforcement capacity within the United States, except where expressly authorized by the Constitution or Congress. Neither of which applied in this case.
The reason for the posse comitatus act is generally thought to be to prevent the executive from using the military against its own citizens. In other words, to prevent dictatorship. In fact, though, it was a response to the military occupation by U.S. Army troops of the former Confederate States during Reconstruction. The effect of it was to strengthen states' rights and to remove protection from former slaves. As Wikipedia points out, as a result of the act, many acts of violence, and a suppression of the vote of some political and racial groups, resulted in the election of state legislators and U.S. congressmen who halted and reversed political reform in the American South.
In other words, the posse comitatus act should be very dear to the hearts of what passes for a Republican party these days. Which I'm sure it is, except when they have the presidency.
John Yoo needs to be deported to whatever dictatorship he is a citizen of. But here's how the Bush administration echoed Saudi Arabia:
Because the Saudi royals pretend to respect Islam but don't want anyone outside of their control telling them what they can or can't do, they have in-house religious authorities. When they decide to do something, they have these authorities issue a fatwa authorizing them to do it. The point of this process obviously is not to get a sincere opinion of what Islam permits; it is to get religious cover for whatever the Royals want done.
John Yoo wrote fatwas like that for the Bush administration, which pretended to respect the Constitution but intended to ignore it. This is not like a lawyer writing a brief and arguing a case; in that position a lawyer is supposed to advocate for his client. Here Yoo was set up as an authority, an oracle, essentially equivalent to the Supreme Court. He was supposed to be revealing constitutional truth. Instead, he was a legal whore in a phony position of power.
Yoo is a tenured professor at U.C. Berkeley, of all places, but I note he isn't teaching there right now. Apparently, Berkeley had sufficient self-respect to ship him off to something called Chapman University School of Law, which I gather is about as competent as Rhode Island's Ralph Pepito School of Law. I hope Berkeley never lets him back.
If abortion doctors can be hounded every hour for what they do, I see no reason why Yoo can't be hounded for what he's done. Why isn't that happening? Do I have to move to California to get it under way?
The reason for the posse comitatus act is generally thought to be to prevent the executive from using the military against its own citizens. In other words, to prevent dictatorship. In fact, though, it was a response to the military occupation by U.S. Army troops of the former Confederate States during Reconstruction. The effect of it was to strengthen states' rights and to remove protection from former slaves. As Wikipedia points out, as a result of the act, many acts of violence, and a suppression of the vote of some political and racial groups, resulted in the election of state legislators and U.S. congressmen who halted and reversed political reform in the American South.
In other words, the posse comitatus act should be very dear to the hearts of what passes for a Republican party these days. Which I'm sure it is, except when they have the presidency.
John Yoo needs to be deported to whatever dictatorship he is a citizen of. But here's how the Bush administration echoed Saudi Arabia:
Because the Saudi royals pretend to respect Islam but don't want anyone outside of their control telling them what they can or can't do, they have in-house religious authorities. When they decide to do something, they have these authorities issue a fatwa authorizing them to do it. The point of this process obviously is not to get a sincere opinion of what Islam permits; it is to get religious cover for whatever the Royals want done.
John Yoo wrote fatwas like that for the Bush administration, which pretended to respect the Constitution but intended to ignore it. This is not like a lawyer writing a brief and arguing a case; in that position a lawyer is supposed to advocate for his client. Here Yoo was set up as an authority, an oracle, essentially equivalent to the Supreme Court. He was supposed to be revealing constitutional truth. Instead, he was a legal whore in a phony position of power.
Yoo is a tenured professor at U.C. Berkeley, of all places, but I note he isn't teaching there right now. Apparently, Berkeley had sufficient self-respect to ship him off to something called Chapman University School of Law, which I gather is about as competent as Rhode Island's Ralph Pepito School of Law. I hope Berkeley never lets him back.
If abortion doctors can be hounded every hour for what they do, I see no reason why Yoo can't be hounded for what he's done. Why isn't that happening? Do I have to move to California to get it under way?
NOT A WORD
Not one of the numerous stories I've seen about the Gates affair has said anything about its context: Boston's awful history of race hatred.
Historically the Irish hated the blacks (they hung them from lampposts in New York during the draft riots of 1863). Boston has been Irish a long time. There have been endless battles between Roxbury (black) and Southie (Irish). Just because they don't talk about it anymore is no reason to assume it's no longer true.
This is the story I grew up with, cribbed from Wikipedia:
Anna Louise Day Hicks (October 16, 1916–October 21, 2003) was an American politician and lawyer from Boston, Massachusetts. She was elected to the Boston School Committee in 1961. In January 1963, she became chairperson and seemed likely to be endorsed by the leading reform group, when, in June, the Boston chapter of the NAACP demanded "an immediate public acknowledgment of de facto segregation in the Boston public school system". At the time, thirteen city schools were at least 90% black — but the Committee refused to acknowledge the segregation. Hicks was recognized as the holdout, and within months she became Boston's most popular politician, but also the most controversial, requiring police bodyguards 24 hours a day. In 1967, she came within 12,000 votes of being elected mayor of Boston, running on the evasively coded slogan "You know where I stand."
Hicks became nationally known in 1965 when she opposed court-ordered busing of students into inner-city schools to achieve integration. By refusing to admit segregation existed in city schools and by declaring that children were the "pawns" of racial politics, she came to personify the discord that existed between some working class Irish-Americans and African-Americans. Her most notable campaign took place in autumn 1975, after a federal judge ordered Boston schools to expand their busing programs to comply with the 1971 Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education decision. To counter the trend, Hicks started an organization called Restore Our Alienated Rights (ROAR) which actively engaged in incidents of massive resistance to school desegregation.
Here's more from Dave Zirin: Barry Bonds stated in 2004: "Boston is too racist for me. I couldn't play there. That's been going on ever since my dad (Bobby) was playing baseball. I can't play like that. That's not for me, brother." When the reporter countered that the racial climate has changed in Boston, Bonds responded, "It ain't changing. It ain't changing nowhere."
The most violent anti-busing demonstrations in America were not in Birmingham or Biloxi but Boston. In 1989, when Charles Stuart, a wealthy white businessman murdered his pregnant wife, he told police that a "Black guy" did it. The police believed him without a whisper of doubt. They launched a vicious manhunt, fanning out through housing projects and sweeping the streets. State politicians whipped up a further frenzy by calling for reinstatement of the death penalty. When Stuart committed suicide after his brother blew the whistle, all police spokeswoman Margot Hill could say without shame was, "(Stuart) took advantage of the environment he was in. He knew exactly what he was doing." It is precisely what Ms. Hill calls "the environment" that has found expression in the world of sports. The Boston Red Sox were the last team in major league baseball to integrate. They waited so long to sign African-Americans, that the hockey team, the Bruins, actually beat them to it. The Sox removed their color line in 1959 twelve years after Jackie Robinson broke through with the Brooklyn Dodgers. In the 1950s, as teams immeasurably strengthened themselves by signing players like Mays, Henry Aaron, Ernie Banks, Don Newcombe, Roy Campanella, Elston Howard, and others, the Red Sox stood pat with an all white hand. (The next time you hear a Boston fan complain about "The Curse of the Bambino", correct them that their "Curse of the Racism" has had a much more adverse effect.)
During the 1950s and 1960s Boston was treated to the most successful run in the history of team sports with the NBA's Celtics winning 11 championships in 13 seasons. The mainstay of that team was a player of immense skill, unselfishness, and leadership: Bill Russell. Russell won five MVPs to go with his 11 rings. In 1967 he became the first African American coach of a pro team. In 1974 he was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame, and in 1980 the country's basketball sports writers voted him "The Greatest Player in the History of the NBA."
His fierce pride (which the media called "a bad attitude") mixed about as well with Boston fans as a John Ashcroft sing along at the Apollo Theater. The result was that the greatest player in Boston team sports history was the target of a constant campaign of racial harassment. When Russell tried to move from his home in the Boston suburb of Reading to a new home across town, neighbors filed a petition trying to block the move. When that failed, other neighbors banded together to try to purchase the home that Russell wanted to buy, said Tom Heinsohn, a close friend of Russell's who played with him from 1956 to 1964. Once, vandals broke into Russell's home and defecated on his bed. Heinsohn said two white sportswriters from Boston told him they wouldn't vote Russell the league's most valuable player because he was Black.
And this, from 2002:
Convinced that the white elected leaders � Boston is one of the few major American cities that's never had a black mayor, and Massachusetts doesn't have a single black in Congress � are afraid to talk about race for fear of committing political suicide, blacks here are kicking down doors for the first time. Doors that, while they don't actually say "Whites Only," have felt that way for years. Mostly, it's out of frustration. They're fed up with having to go to Dorchester � or DC, for that matter � to hit a bar, restaurant, baseball game, or any scene where they won't feel the way those workers at Vox must have felt for one measly night.
"This city, for white people, is the best place in the world," Cummings says. "The biggest misconception in the black community is it's not for us � the Symphony, Fenway, everything. They're not made to feel welcome. But they should go anyway."
And there's plenty more like that out there.
It's not fair, without specific evidence, to imply that Crowley is an heir to this ignoble tradition. But covering the Gates story without referencing Boston's history is about as dishonest as it gets.
Now - anyone who's gone to school in Boston, particularly to one of the elite schools, is very aware of townie resentment of these elites. Not that I blame them - Harvard people do tend to look down on the common folk, judging that their intelligence overrides townie common sense. Here's what the college guys think of townies:
They're locals and happy with that. They'll know all the local spots and local people. The stereotyped generalization is that they've never been more than 50 miles from home except when they went to Disney World. Someday if they ever get the urge to see the world, they might go to Jamaica for a week. Or maybe Aruba is the new Jamaica. I haven't lived here for 5 generations so I'm just visiting. Seriously, it's not that bad and you should get to know these people. When you need a plumber or someone to plow your driveway, townies can be invaluable resources.
Here's a story from 1931. Here's one that's really arrogant (though no doubt true.) Spend some time on Google and you'll find out all you want to know about townie-collegiate conflict in Boston.
And yet the fact that Crowley is a townie and that Gates is everything a townie hates also has not been mentioned once.
With TV news like we've got, what chance do we have to understand anything?
______________________________
It's getting out there now, though:
Historically the Irish hated the blacks (they hung them from lampposts in New York during the draft riots of 1863). Boston has been Irish a long time. There have been endless battles between Roxbury (black) and Southie (Irish). Just because they don't talk about it anymore is no reason to assume it's no longer true.
This is the story I grew up with, cribbed from Wikipedia:
Anna Louise Day Hicks (October 16, 1916–October 21, 2003) was an American politician and lawyer from Boston, Massachusetts. She was elected to the Boston School Committee in 1961. In January 1963, she became chairperson and seemed likely to be endorsed by the leading reform group, when, in June, the Boston chapter of the NAACP demanded "an immediate public acknowledgment of de facto segregation in the Boston public school system". At the time, thirteen city schools were at least 90% black — but the Committee refused to acknowledge the segregation. Hicks was recognized as the holdout, and within months she became Boston's most popular politician, but also the most controversial, requiring police bodyguards 24 hours a day. In 1967, she came within 12,000 votes of being elected mayor of Boston, running on the evasively coded slogan "You know where I stand."
Hicks became nationally known in 1965 when she opposed court-ordered busing of students into inner-city schools to achieve integration. By refusing to admit segregation existed in city schools and by declaring that children were the "pawns" of racial politics, she came to personify the discord that existed between some working class Irish-Americans and African-Americans. Her most notable campaign took place in autumn 1975, after a federal judge ordered Boston schools to expand their busing programs to comply with the 1971 Swann v. Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education decision. To counter the trend, Hicks started an organization called Restore Our Alienated Rights (ROAR) which actively engaged in incidents of massive resistance to school desegregation.
Here's more from Dave Zirin: Barry Bonds stated in 2004: "Boston is too racist for me. I couldn't play there. That's been going on ever since my dad (Bobby) was playing baseball. I can't play like that. That's not for me, brother." When the reporter countered that the racial climate has changed in Boston, Bonds responded, "It ain't changing. It ain't changing nowhere."
The most violent anti-busing demonstrations in America were not in Birmingham or Biloxi but Boston. In 1989, when Charles Stuart, a wealthy white businessman murdered his pregnant wife, he told police that a "Black guy" did it. The police believed him without a whisper of doubt. They launched a vicious manhunt, fanning out through housing projects and sweeping the streets. State politicians whipped up a further frenzy by calling for reinstatement of the death penalty. When Stuart committed suicide after his brother blew the whistle, all police spokeswoman Margot Hill could say without shame was, "(Stuart) took advantage of the environment he was in. He knew exactly what he was doing." It is precisely what Ms. Hill calls "the environment" that has found expression in the world of sports. The Boston Red Sox were the last team in major league baseball to integrate. They waited so long to sign African-Americans, that the hockey team, the Bruins, actually beat them to it. The Sox removed their color line in 1959 twelve years after Jackie Robinson broke through with the Brooklyn Dodgers. In the 1950s, as teams immeasurably strengthened themselves by signing players like Mays, Henry Aaron, Ernie Banks, Don Newcombe, Roy Campanella, Elston Howard, and others, the Red Sox stood pat with an all white hand. (The next time you hear a Boston fan complain about "The Curse of the Bambino", correct them that their "Curse of the Racism" has had a much more adverse effect.)
During the 1950s and 1960s Boston was treated to the most successful run in the history of team sports with the NBA's Celtics winning 11 championships in 13 seasons. The mainstay of that team was a player of immense skill, unselfishness, and leadership: Bill Russell. Russell won five MVPs to go with his 11 rings. In 1967 he became the first African American coach of a pro team. In 1974 he was elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame, and in 1980 the country's basketball sports writers voted him "The Greatest Player in the History of the NBA."
His fierce pride (which the media called "a bad attitude") mixed about as well with Boston fans as a John Ashcroft sing along at the Apollo Theater. The result was that the greatest player in Boston team sports history was the target of a constant campaign of racial harassment. When Russell tried to move from his home in the Boston suburb of Reading to a new home across town, neighbors filed a petition trying to block the move. When that failed, other neighbors banded together to try to purchase the home that Russell wanted to buy, said Tom Heinsohn, a close friend of Russell's who played with him from 1956 to 1964. Once, vandals broke into Russell's home and defecated on his bed. Heinsohn said two white sportswriters from Boston told him they wouldn't vote Russell the league's most valuable player because he was Black.
And this, from 2002:
Convinced that the white elected leaders � Boston is one of the few major American cities that's never had a black mayor, and Massachusetts doesn't have a single black in Congress � are afraid to talk about race for fear of committing political suicide, blacks here are kicking down doors for the first time. Doors that, while they don't actually say "Whites Only," have felt that way for years. Mostly, it's out of frustration. They're fed up with having to go to Dorchester � or DC, for that matter � to hit a bar, restaurant, baseball game, or any scene where they won't feel the way those workers at Vox must have felt for one measly night.
"This city, for white people, is the best place in the world," Cummings says. "The biggest misconception in the black community is it's not for us � the Symphony, Fenway, everything. They're not made to feel welcome. But they should go anyway."
And there's plenty more like that out there.
It's not fair, without specific evidence, to imply that Crowley is an heir to this ignoble tradition. But covering the Gates story without referencing Boston's history is about as dishonest as it gets.
Now - anyone who's gone to school in Boston, particularly to one of the elite schools, is very aware of townie resentment of these elites. Not that I blame them - Harvard people do tend to look down on the common folk, judging that their intelligence overrides townie common sense. Here's what the college guys think of townies:
They're locals and happy with that. They'll know all the local spots and local people. The stereotyped generalization is that they've never been more than 50 miles from home except when they went to Disney World. Someday if they ever get the urge to see the world, they might go to Jamaica for a week. Or maybe Aruba is the new Jamaica. I haven't lived here for 5 generations so I'm just visiting. Seriously, it's not that bad and you should get to know these people. When you need a plumber or someone to plow your driveway, townies can be invaluable resources.
Here's a story from 1931. Here's one that's really arrogant (though no doubt true.) Spend some time on Google and you'll find out all you want to know about townie-collegiate conflict in Boston.
And yet the fact that Crowley is a townie and that Gates is everything a townie hates also has not been mentioned once.
With TV news like we've got, what chance do we have to understand anything?
______________________________
It's getting out there now, though:
Michele Bachmann Blocks Resolution Proclaiming Hawaii Obama's Birthplace
Michele Bachmann Blocks Resolution Proclaiming Hawaii Obama's Birthplace
Next week a resolution proclaiming Bachmann's birthplace to be Mars.
Next week a resolution proclaiming Bachmann's birthplace to be Mars.
The Hill’s Blog Briefing Room � Voinovich slams DeMint and Coburn for GOP downfall; blames ‘the southerners’
Naked Indian Girls Plow Fields To "Embarrass Weather Gods"
Naked Indian Girls Plow Fields To "Embarrass Weather Gods"
Texas ought to try this. It fits in with their mindset, and I bet the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders could get a lot more rain than some Gujarati peasants.
Texas ought to try this. It fits in with their mindset, and I bet the Dallas Cowboy cheerleaders could get a lot more rain than some Gujarati peasants.
Off The Charts Drought In Texas, Tornadoes In New York (VIDEO)
Off The Charts Drought In Texas, Tornadoes In New York (VIDEO)
Wonder what they're thinking in Texas now: do they think God is punishing Texas for misrepresenting Him, or are they getting ready to be Raptured up?
I'm for the latter. No need to secede. They just disappear.
Wonder what they're thinking in Texas now: do they think God is punishing Texas for misrepresenting Him, or are they getting ready to be Raptured up?
I'm for the latter. No need to secede. They just disappear.
O'S WATCHDOG SNIFFING OUT RICH PAY PACKAGES - New York Post
O'S WATCHDOG SNIFFING OUT RICH PAY PACKAGES - New York Post
Note Goldman Sachs has gotten themselves out of this.
Note Goldman Sachs has gotten themselves out of this.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Michael J. Panzner: Wall Street's Gains Equal Main Street's Loss?
Michael J. Panzner: Wall Street's Gains Equal Main Street's Loss?
A stock goes up because it beats the market's expectations. What the hell does that actually mean?
There is a tendency now to anthropomorphize the market. "The market" is the guy with all the wisdom in the world, the guy who always knows what's what. Why turn the market into an actual human being? Because then the people who actually make the market do what it does can point away from themselves and at something easy to understand. It's nice to believe that God wants whatever happens; it validates any result, fortunate or unfortunate. It's nice to assert that some big guy out there is making the market work efficiently - so when things go to shit it's because he wants it that way.
The market's expectation are what some people say it is. Apparently they base this on a whispered conversation with the Big Market Guy - sort of the same sort of relationship as Republicans have to God.
The entire concept of market expectation is absurd - even if it existed, there is no sane way to know what it is. But then sanity is not a hallmark of our society these days.
That the public believes in "market expectation" is ludicrous. But then it believes in Glenn Beck, too.
Market expectation is a mechanism, or an excuse, by which the people who run Wall Street can cash in on bets. The people who define this expectation are never exactly identified, for good reason. It's better that we don't know who we are, so we can't ask them what the hell they're talking about.
I don't read much Wall Street stuff, but it's my impression that the market's expectation is never announced until the stock has either missed it or beaten it - in other words, after the fact. (I could be wrong about that, but how much does it matter, really, whether I'm wrong?) I.e., market expectation is a phony explanation of why a stock gets trashed or rises. The real explanation is a manipulation that we will most likely never know about.
Putting your money in the market is like betting the horses. Unless you've got a lot of it so you can give it to the guy who either is doing or knows about the manipulation (and then pray he isn't another Madoff), you might as well pick stocks by numerology. America's faith in most brokers or mutual fund managers is like putting it in witch doctors who promise rain. Fundamentals, my ass. The only fundamental is knowing whether the game is afoot with a particular issue - the game including puffing a stock or panicking people into selling it. And you probably don't know the guy who knows the answer. That's the guy who knows how the race is fixed.
A stock goes up because it beats the market's expectations. What the hell does that actually mean?
There is a tendency now to anthropomorphize the market. "The market" is the guy with all the wisdom in the world, the guy who always knows what's what. Why turn the market into an actual human being? Because then the people who actually make the market do what it does can point away from themselves and at something easy to understand. It's nice to believe that God wants whatever happens; it validates any result, fortunate or unfortunate. It's nice to assert that some big guy out there is making the market work efficiently - so when things go to shit it's because he wants it that way.
The market's expectation are what some people say it is. Apparently they base this on a whispered conversation with the Big Market Guy - sort of the same sort of relationship as Republicans have to God.
The entire concept of market expectation is absurd - even if it existed, there is no sane way to know what it is. But then sanity is not a hallmark of our society these days.
That the public believes in "market expectation" is ludicrous. But then it believes in Glenn Beck, too.
Market expectation is a mechanism, or an excuse, by which the people who run Wall Street can cash in on bets. The people who define this expectation are never exactly identified, for good reason. It's better that we don't know who we are, so we can't ask them what the hell they're talking about.
I don't read much Wall Street stuff, but it's my impression that the market's expectation is never announced until the stock has either missed it or beaten it - in other words, after the fact. (I could be wrong about that, but how much does it matter, really, whether I'm wrong?) I.e., market expectation is a phony explanation of why a stock gets trashed or rises. The real explanation is a manipulation that we will most likely never know about.
Putting your money in the market is like betting the horses. Unless you've got a lot of it so you can give it to the guy who either is doing or knows about the manipulation (and then pray he isn't another Madoff), you might as well pick stocks by numerology. America's faith in most brokers or mutual fund managers is like putting it in witch doctors who promise rain. Fundamentals, my ass. The only fundamental is knowing whether the game is afoot with a particular issue - the game including puffing a stock or panicking people into selling it. And you probably don't know the guy who knows the answer. That's the guy who knows how the race is fixed.
POSTSCRIPT
I am not optimistic about the future of American democracy. So I've got to figure out where - if anywhere - I'd rather be.
OMISSION
I've had a chance to look at "Constructive Anatomy", a book written for artists by George B. Bridgman. On the cover of the 1960 paperback edition there is a photograph of a nude female model posing for a drawing class. But in the book, written in 1920, there is not a single drawing of the female anatomy other than the head.
Lady Chatterley's Lover was not published until 1928. But I've seen plenty of photos of Victorian nudes. So what explains this omission?
Who knows?
Lady Chatterley's Lover was not published until 1928. But I've seen plenty of photos of Victorian nudes. So what explains this omission?
Who knows?
NOTHINGS AND FRAUDS
Central Equine: The Zada Saga Continues...
What bothers me about this little scandal is that, after this guy has failed over a number of years to pay back millions of dollars he claims he "borrowed," some of the people he suckered are still defending him.
I think I know why.
Zada apparently was a focal node for a group of people for whom wealth and status was everything. Riding on his supposed status, they enhanced their own reputations by "investing" with him or, even worse, as he claims, "loaning" him big sums of money when he was reputed to be a very wealthy man. Now that he's on the way to being proven a nothing and a fraud, these people are afraid that they too are being proven nothings and frauds - and they're right, they are.
What bothers me about this little scandal is that, after this guy has failed over a number of years to pay back millions of dollars he claims he "borrowed," some of the people he suckered are still defending him.
I think I know why.
Zada apparently was a focal node for a group of people for whom wealth and status was everything. Riding on his supposed status, they enhanced their own reputations by "investing" with him or, even worse, as he claims, "loaning" him big sums of money when he was reputed to be a very wealthy man. Now that he's on the way to being proven a nothing and a fraud, these people are afraid that they too are being proven nothings and frauds - and they're right, they are.
ASSHOLES
Bill Kristol: Obama "Is An Arrogant Man" (VIDEO)
DeMint: Obama Is "Out Of Control"
This is what Republicanism has become. Not policy arguments, personal insults. They learned their politics from the Jerry Springer Show. Pretty soon they're going to start leaping over Congressional desks and trying to throttle Democrats. That's the next Springer move. The last time that happened, a Civil War broke out.
But I celebrate this state of affairs, because when I call them assholes, they can relate.
I expect to hear from my Republican friends that Democrats do the same. Yes they do. But how else do you survive in this environment? Besides, usually they're pretty funny about it - Tina Fey and Jon Stewart and Bill Maher and even David Letterman (the only jokes he ever told that I found funny were about Sarah Palin and John McCain). There's nothing funny about Republicans.
The difference between Democrats and Republicans on this - for the most part - is that the insults are coming from the Republicans' political leaders, not sideshows. Part of the reason for this, I suspect, is that nowadays the American political campaign never ends. A newly elected politician is like a new car; he or she loses value as soon as he or she is driven out of the showroom, and people are already trying to talk you into your next vehicle.
So politicians use campaign rhetoric - which has always included insults - all the time. The civility which used to rule in actual lawmaking has been overrun by these constant campaigns. That's not so good for the prospect of ever getting anything done. And it's something that Obama has been a long time coming to understand.
DeMint: Obama Is "Out Of Control"
This is what Republicanism has become. Not policy arguments, personal insults. They learned their politics from the Jerry Springer Show. Pretty soon they're going to start leaping over Congressional desks and trying to throttle Democrats. That's the next Springer move. The last time that happened, a Civil War broke out.
But I celebrate this state of affairs, because when I call them assholes, they can relate.
I expect to hear from my Republican friends that Democrats do the same. Yes they do. But how else do you survive in this environment? Besides, usually they're pretty funny about it - Tina Fey and Jon Stewart and Bill Maher and even David Letterman (the only jokes he ever told that I found funny were about Sarah Palin and John McCain). There's nothing funny about Republicans.
The difference between Democrats and Republicans on this - for the most part - is that the insults are coming from the Republicans' political leaders, not sideshows. Part of the reason for this, I suspect, is that nowadays the American political campaign never ends. A newly elected politician is like a new car; he or she loses value as soon as he or she is driven out of the showroom, and people are already trying to talk you into your next vehicle.
So politicians use campaign rhetoric - which has always included insults - all the time. The civility which used to rule in actual lawmaking has been overrun by these constant campaigns. That's not so good for the prospect of ever getting anything done. And it's something that Obama has been a long time coming to understand.
Saturday, July 25, 2009
The Associated Press: NJ official steps down amid corruption arrests
The Associated Press: NJ official steps down amid corruption arrests
For me, this is a universal story, insofar as the rabbis are concerned.
Whether it's Catholic priests hitting on kids, Christian fundamentalists having affairs or rabbis making money from criminal conduct, it seems that for at least some, the practice of religion has been totally divorced from the content of the religion - or at least its ethical content. I do not get the point of having a religion (the ultimate justification for which is the regulation of human conduct) if you're not going to do what it tells you to do.
How do these people explain themselves?
For me, this is a universal story, insofar as the rabbis are concerned.
Whether it's Catholic priests hitting on kids, Christian fundamentalists having affairs or rabbis making money from criminal conduct, it seems that for at least some, the practice of religion has been totally divorced from the content of the religion - or at least its ethical content. I do not get the point of having a religion (the ultimate justification for which is the regulation of human conduct) if you're not going to do what it tells you to do.
How do these people explain themselves?
Cracking Down, Antitrust Chief Hits Resistance - NYTimes.com
Cracking Down, Antitrust Chief Hits Resistance - NYTimes.com
I don't know about these particular issues, but I would be thrilled to see antitrust make a comeback. The existence of a company "too big to fail" is a clear invitation for antitrust action. I suspect we would not have had an economic meltdown if Clinton's and Bush' antitrust people had not laid down on the job. Lest we forget, this was Teddy Roosevelt's Republican concept. (Or was he a Bull Moose by then?) These days, no one has even heard of it.
I don't know about these particular issues, but I would be thrilled to see antitrust make a comeback. The existence of a company "too big to fail" is a clear invitation for antitrust action. I suspect we would not have had an economic meltdown if Clinton's and Bush' antitrust people had not laid down on the job. Lest we forget, this was Teddy Roosevelt's Republican concept. (Or was he a Bull Moose by then?) These days, no one has even heard of it.
HUH?
Michelle Bachmann describes herself as "a mother of five biological children and a foster mother to 23 children." Now I think it's commendable that she fosters 23 kids - but those kids are not biological?
It's too bad she has to use words to communicate. She'd probably sound brighter if she limited herself to grunting.
It's too bad she has to use words to communicate. She'd probably sound brighter if she limited herself to grunting.
FOR THE BEST
The problem the Democrats are having with health care is that the negotiating process by which the final bill will be designed - theoretically part of any legislative development - is being fully reported. That means that every proposal by anyone gets out to the public, necessarily creating confusion as to what is in the works. If the public is allowed to consider and judge even proposals which have no chance of getting into the bill, accumulating doubts will reduce public support for health care.
The Republicans, when in power, would never have let this happen. Their bills were written in secret, after extensive consultation with the special interests whose requirements they wanted to meet; they allowed no amendments and little debate and they rushed the legislation through so quickly that most congresspeople never even read it. The only chance for public confusion over their legislation arose from the lies they told the public about what was in the bills. That was always after the fact, and confusion didn't arise often, because if you only know what you're told there's nothing to confuse you.
Democrats could have, and probably should have, done the same with the health bill. They have the votes to do it. Once the language was fixed, they could easily have debunked all the anecdotal arguments now being made citing problems which actually have nothing to do with the proposed legislation. Republicans, having no alternative proposals, could only speak in the negative. Assuming, as polls seem to show, that the public does want change in health care, a well designed PR and advertising campaign could have sold the bill fairly easily. The Republicans did that a hundred times.
But that's not the way Democrats want to see things done. They want to hear and debate alternatives, with the goal of coming up with the best program, not just passing something which soothes the unions, etc. Consultations have been held with interest groups on all sides of the issue. Proposals from all sides have at least been considered. The fact that there is no bill yet is only proof that consultations continue. It's called democracy.
It's a dirty process - meaning it isn't neat - but it's what's supposed to happen in a democracy. And it's what usually happens when Congress searches for the best rather than legislating only what their contributors want to see.
The Republicans, when in power, would never have let this happen. Their bills were written in secret, after extensive consultation with the special interests whose requirements they wanted to meet; they allowed no amendments and little debate and they rushed the legislation through so quickly that most congresspeople never even read it. The only chance for public confusion over their legislation arose from the lies they told the public about what was in the bills. That was always after the fact, and confusion didn't arise often, because if you only know what you're told there's nothing to confuse you.
Democrats could have, and probably should have, done the same with the health bill. They have the votes to do it. Once the language was fixed, they could easily have debunked all the anecdotal arguments now being made citing problems which actually have nothing to do with the proposed legislation. Republicans, having no alternative proposals, could only speak in the negative. Assuming, as polls seem to show, that the public does want change in health care, a well designed PR and advertising campaign could have sold the bill fairly easily. The Republicans did that a hundred times.
But that's not the way Democrats want to see things done. They want to hear and debate alternatives, with the goal of coming up with the best program, not just passing something which soothes the unions, etc. Consultations have been held with interest groups on all sides of the issue. Proposals from all sides have at least been considered. The fact that there is no bill yet is only proof that consultations continue. It's called democracy.
It's a dirty process - meaning it isn't neat - but it's what's supposed to happen in a democracy. And it's what usually happens when Congress searches for the best rather than legislating only what their contributors want to see.
Friday, July 24, 2009
WHY BOTHER?
How much time are you going to spend debating politics with Republicans? It's like talking theology with the pope. He knows what he knows, he's not going to change his mind- at least, not as a result of talking to the likes of you.
There's a good reason Republicans talk with a unified voice, so that you know what you're going to hear from them (even the specific metaphors) before they even start speaking - while Democrats squabble about everything. It's not just good tactical politics - it's shared theology, down to the noun and verb. It is not discussable. You agree with it or you don't.
I don't question that it's effective politically. I don't question their beliefs. I question why I'm wasting my time trying to talk to them. If I already know what they're going to say, I could probably find something better to do.
There's a good reason Republicans talk with a unified voice, so that you know what you're going to hear from them (even the specific metaphors) before they even start speaking - while Democrats squabble about everything. It's not just good tactical politics - it's shared theology, down to the noun and verb. It is not discussable. You agree with it or you don't.
I don't question that it's effective politically. I don't question their beliefs. I question why I'm wasting my time trying to talk to them. If I already know what they're going to say, I could probably find something better to do.
SIMPLE ANSWERS
In dealing with Khomeini's Iranian revolution, American conservatives had a simple answer, whether Democrat or Republican: crush the revolution with as much force as was necessary.
Those on the left were faced with a dilemma. Crushing the revolution would likely save the shah, in the short term anyway. But how could they support the killing of people whose only goal was to free themselves from what they perceived as tyranny? How would this be consistent with American ideals? In the end they could not resolve the dilemma.
Thus it has been since then, and before then. For conservatives there is always a simple answer - do what is necessary to retain or extend American power , by which they have always meant THEIR power. They may talk about American ideals, but these are always to be sacrificed for pure power - even when the threat faced is minimal.
For progressives there's often no way out. You can't argue with the proposition that a few well placed tanks or bombs may, in the short term, preserve the status quo or possibly even improve it from the point of view of the security of the nation. But what if doing that compels you to do things you can't conceive of America doing?
This is the quandary of the democratic soul. It's a tremendous advantage not even to have to think about it.
Those on the left were faced with a dilemma. Crushing the revolution would likely save the shah, in the short term anyway. But how could they support the killing of people whose only goal was to free themselves from what they perceived as tyranny? How would this be consistent with American ideals? In the end they could not resolve the dilemma.
Thus it has been since then, and before then. For conservatives there is always a simple answer - do what is necessary to retain or extend American power , by which they have always meant THEIR power. They may talk about American ideals, but these are always to be sacrificed for pure power - even when the threat faced is minimal.
For progressives there's often no way out. You can't argue with the proposition that a few well placed tanks or bombs may, in the short term, preserve the status quo or possibly even improve it from the point of view of the security of the nation. But what if doing that compels you to do things you can't conceive of America doing?
This is the quandary of the democratic soul. It's a tremendous advantage not even to have to think about it.
LET ME BE CLEAR ON THIS
If the Cambridge cop had said he was outraged by Obama's rush to judgment, he would have been well within his rights. But to say he is disgraced that Obama is his commander in chief - weeelll, that sort of means he has a black thing, don't it? Or at least a Democrat thing.
Would he have said that if Ronald Reagan had called him stupid? His comment seems to me the equivalent of calling Obama "boy."
So now this is the fifth post I've written about a conflict between two people I don't like. What the hell is the matter with me?
Would he have said that if Ronald Reagan had called him stupid? His comment seems to me the equivalent of calling Obama "boy."
So now this is the fifth post I've written about a conflict between two people I don't like. What the hell is the matter with me?
Skip Gates and the Post-Racial Project
Skip Gates and the Post-Racial Project
I'm sorry, but African American Studies is political by definition. Does Harvard have a White American Studies program?
I'm sorry, but African American Studies is political by definition. Does Harvard have a White American Studies program?
GATES' STORY
TR: Can you describe, in your own words, what went on in and outside of your home? When did you suspect you were the victim of racial profiling?
HLG: I just finished making my new documentary series for PBS called “Faces of America.” It was a glorious week in Shanghai and Ningbo and Beijing, and on my trip, I took my daughter along. After we finished working in Ningbo we went to Beijing and had three glorious days as tourists. It was great fun.
This is relevant to what? Only to self-defining Gates as someone very special. Already I don't like the guy.
We flew back on a direct flight from Beijing to Newark. We arrived on Wednesday, and on Thursday I flew back to Cambridge. I was using my regular driver and my regular car service. And went to my home arriving at about 12:30 in the afternoon. My driver and I carried several bags up to the porch, and we fiddled with the door and it was jammed. I thought, well, maybe the door’s latched. So I walked back to the kitchen porch, unlocked the door and came into the house. And I unlatched the door, but it was still jammed.
My driver is a large black man. But from afar you and I would not have seen he was black.
So - is that a good thing?
He has black hair and was dressed in a two-piece black suit, and I was dressed in a navy blue blazer with gray trousers and, you know, my shoes. And I love that the 911 report said that two big black men were trying to break in with backpacks on. Now that is the worst racial profiling I’ve ever heard of in my life. (Laughs.) I’m not exactly a big black man. I thought that was hilarious when I found that out, which was yesterday.
It looked like someone’s footprint was there. So it’s possible that the door had been jimmied, that someone had tried to get in while I was in China. But for whatever reason, the lock was damaged. My driver hit the door with his shoulder and the door popped open. But the lock was permanently disfigured. My home is owned by Harvard University, and so any kind of repair work that’s needed, Harvard will come and do it. I called this person, and she was, in fact, on the line while all of this was going on.
So when do we hear from her?
HLG: I just finished making my new documentary series for PBS called “Faces of America.” It was a glorious week in Shanghai and Ningbo and Beijing, and on my trip, I took my daughter along. After we finished working in Ningbo we went to Beijing and had three glorious days as tourists. It was great fun.
This is relevant to what? Only to self-defining Gates as someone very special. Already I don't like the guy.
We flew back on a direct flight from Beijing to Newark. We arrived on Wednesday, and on Thursday I flew back to Cambridge. I was using my regular driver and my regular car service. And went to my home arriving at about 12:30 in the afternoon. My driver and I carried several bags up to the porch, and we fiddled with the door and it was jammed. I thought, well, maybe the door’s latched. So I walked back to the kitchen porch, unlocked the door and came into the house. And I unlatched the door, but it was still jammed.
My driver is a large black man. But from afar you and I would not have seen he was black.
So - is that a good thing?
He has black hair and was dressed in a two-piece black suit, and I was dressed in a navy blue blazer with gray trousers and, you know, my shoes. And I love that the 911 report said that two big black men were trying to break in with backpacks on. Now that is the worst racial profiling I’ve ever heard of in my life. (Laughs.) I’m not exactly a big black man. I thought that was hilarious when I found that out, which was yesterday.
It looked like someone’s footprint was there. So it’s possible that the door had been jimmied, that someone had tried to get in while I was in China. But for whatever reason, the lock was damaged. My driver hit the door with his shoulder and the door popped open. But the lock was permanently disfigured. My home is owned by Harvard University, and so any kind of repair work that’s needed, Harvard will come and do it. I called this person, and she was, in fact, on the line while all of this was going on.
So when do we hear from her?
THEY WON'T
Up to now, I have seen no facts on the Gates matter. I have heard allegations. Until all that can be known is put on the table, I have no idea who was at fault in the incident. What is clear is that both side are determined to make it a racial cause celebre.
The police may have been profiling, or they may not have. But rather than following the wise course of shutting up and letting the incident die, they are loudly claiming victimhood, expressing the same sort of white resentment as some of the firefighters in the Sotomayor "reverse discrimination" case.
I know nothing about Gates, but he seems to be doing the same sort of screaming. Maybe he was profiled, but if so, that's not all of it. I have a feeling that some black academics feel pretty insecure about the status they've achieved, and are quick to anoint themselves victims, too. Or maybe he is self-promoting inside the black community. If so, it could be his ego that's driving it, or it could be a need to make common ground with blacks he has left behind and who may see him as too white. Maybe he needs to be praised for his gangsta tactics. Maybe he needs credentials as a black man. Maybe he needs the press coverage.
Both sides seem to be locked into the past. And Obama did make a mistake in supporting Gates without knowing the facts - because it was an endorsement of the past in contravention of his own stated belief that we are in a post-racial society. It doesn't help that his comments tend to feed the rage of those of us who have not managed to go post-racial - people who are generationally irrelevant to America's future and who will not be able to share in that future.
Everybody needs to shut up. But they won't.
The police may have been profiling, or they may not have. But rather than following the wise course of shutting up and letting the incident die, they are loudly claiming victimhood, expressing the same sort of white resentment as some of the firefighters in the Sotomayor "reverse discrimination" case.
I know nothing about Gates, but he seems to be doing the same sort of screaming. Maybe he was profiled, but if so, that's not all of it. I have a feeling that some black academics feel pretty insecure about the status they've achieved, and are quick to anoint themselves victims, too. Or maybe he is self-promoting inside the black community. If so, it could be his ego that's driving it, or it could be a need to make common ground with blacks he has left behind and who may see him as too white. Maybe he needs to be praised for his gangsta tactics. Maybe he needs credentials as a black man. Maybe he needs the press coverage.
Both sides seem to be locked into the past. And Obama did make a mistake in supporting Gates without knowing the facts - because it was an endorsement of the past in contravention of his own stated belief that we are in a post-racial society. It doesn't help that his comments tend to feed the rage of those of us who have not managed to go post-racial - people who are generationally irrelevant to America's future and who will not be able to share in that future.
Everybody needs to shut up. But they won't.
The House of Representatives will recess at the close of business on Friday, July 31st and the Senate on Friday, August 7th. Don’t waste time until September. Sign up now for C Street Vacation Bible School!
Share spiritual summer fun with your friends at the Fellowship. This year classes will be taught by experienced alumni –
John Ensign: “Love Thy Neighbor, Especially If She Works For You.”
Chip Pickering: “God’s Cell Phone Has a Family Plan.”
Mark Sanford: “The Ardent Argentina Tango of the Soul.”
This year’s craft project: beaded Bible covers designed by Doug Coe.
Image by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com
WHICH FATE?
The two most honorable men of the last quarter of the twentieth century - the men who most embodied what religion supposedly teaches - were Jimmy Carter and Anwar Sadat.
It's unlikely (he may not have the stuff, being too much a pragmatist), but Obama could possibly join that crew. As far as his opposition is concerned, he already has, because he is at least as despised as those two were.
Whether or not he becomes saintly, or is perceived to be (being a saint is historically a very dangerous thing; people cannot tolerate men who have the balls to be better than they are, and saints often preach things damaging to the ordinary guy - who will, some years on, glorify the saint as a useful tool {see Martin Luther King Day} while completely ignoring what he taught), Obama already runs the risk of the fates of those two. Let's hope it's Carter's fate, not Sadat's, that may await him. We don't need a martyr right now.
It's unlikely (he may not have the stuff, being too much a pragmatist), but Obama could possibly join that crew. As far as his opposition is concerned, he already has, because he is at least as despised as those two were.
Whether or not he becomes saintly, or is perceived to be (being a saint is historically a very dangerous thing; people cannot tolerate men who have the balls to be better than they are, and saints often preach things damaging to the ordinary guy - who will, some years on, glorify the saint as a useful tool {see Martin Luther King Day} while completely ignoring what he taught), Obama already runs the risk of the fates of those two. Let's hope it's Carter's fate, not Sadat's, that may await him. We don't need a martyr right now.
Michigan Messenger � Stupak denies knowledge of connections to mysterious ‘C Street’ house he lives in
Michigan Messenger � Stupak denies knowledge of connections to mysterious ‘C Street’ house he lives in
This whole C Street thing sounds so 19th century. In those days, nearly all congressmen lived in boarding houses. I don't think that most of those boarding houses, however, had a specific point of view or rules for behavior beyond not spitting on Mrs. Spratley's rug.
This whole C Street thing sounds so 19th century. In those days, nearly all congressmen lived in boarding houses. I don't think that most of those boarding houses, however, had a specific point of view or rules for behavior beyond not spitting on Mrs. Spratley's rug.
UNCIVIL DISCOURSE
Every single move Obama makes is immediately transformed into some socialistic/Nazi/Witch doctor conspiracy theory ... - Crooks & Liars
And who's responsible for that? Us liberals.
When George Carlin - to our applause - loosed the seven words you weren't supposed to say into civil discourse, we didn't anticipate that the next seven words would be "socialist, Nazi, fascist, racist, unAmerican, terrorist and Muslim."
Of course, there should be one big difference between these types of words. When you say "shit" you don't have to prove that what you're saying is true. Unfortunately, the same now goes for "socialist."
The best us liberals can come up with is "dickhead." Ancient stuff, like Lenny Bruce. They should call us conservatives, since we're stuck in the naive past. Well - I've seen a lot of "Repuglicans" - but come on, that's far too punnish to be absorbed into common parlance. I do like "Repignofascist". Such creative linguistics. But it's got too many syllables for most of us. Anyway, if you'll notice, the new Republican curse words are not newly created - they all carry a history. You say the word and images come to mind. We're not looking for artistic here.
Everything is our fault anyway.
And who's responsible for that? Us liberals.
When George Carlin - to our applause - loosed the seven words you weren't supposed to say into civil discourse, we didn't anticipate that the next seven words would be "socialist, Nazi, fascist, racist, unAmerican, terrorist and Muslim."
Of course, there should be one big difference between these types of words. When you say "shit" you don't have to prove that what you're saying is true. Unfortunately, the same now goes for "socialist."
The best us liberals can come up with is "dickhead." Ancient stuff, like Lenny Bruce. They should call us conservatives, since we're stuck in the naive past. Well - I've seen a lot of "Repuglicans" - but come on, that's far too punnish to be absorbed into common parlance. I do like "Repignofascist". Such creative linguistics. But it's got too many syllables for most of us. Anyway, if you'll notice, the new Republican curse words are not newly created - they all carry a history. You say the word and images come to mind. We're not looking for artistic here.
Everything is our fault anyway.
TOO MUCH WORK
When the MSM got kicked out of Iran, coverage of that story almost entirely disappeared. Most news these days results from PR handouts. Except for a very few great investigative reporters, If the MSM can't get easy access to a story they lose all interest in it. As far as they're concerned it doesn't exist.
In what other profession are there no consequences for failure to meet reasonable expectations? Oh yeah - finance and politics.
In what other profession are there no consequences for failure to meet reasonable expectations? Oh yeah - finance and politics.
GOOD OL' NATE
A very tiny percentage of the daily news amounts to reporting a newly-discovered fact or event. A tiny percentage of that tiny percentage amounts to reporting a new fact or event that actually matters - as opposed, for example, to the reporting on local Florida news of a car crash in Iowa. Most of the news is opinion about what is happening or what is going to happen. A small percentage of that is based on scientific method or is the opinion of someone who's done the work on which a worthwhile opinion can be based. Most MSM opinion is completely worthless, because nobody knows what's going to happen and damn few understand what is actually happening. It's also useless, because what is supposed to matter is what does happen, not what someone thinks will happen. The confusion of those two is why people are so uninformed - and also why the MSM survives.
Some wisdom from Nate Silver:
Firstly, the media environment has become very treacherous. There's been all sorts of piling on, for instance, about last night's satisfactory press conference -- this is almost certainly the most sustained stretch of bad coverage for Obama since back when Jeremiah Wright became a household name after the Ohio primary. I don't think the media has a liberal bias or a conservative bias so much as it has a bias toward overreacting to short-term trends and a tendency toward groupthink.
In the MSM, everything is equally important, and everything changes everything forever. Picture a perfectly balanced seesaw. A tiny breeze blows and the seesaw tilts ever so slightly toward one side. The entire MSM jumps on that side and drives it into the ground. They're not reporting. They're screaming to get your attention.
Back to Nate:
The media likes to talk about "momentum". It usually talks about the momentum in the present tense -- as in, "health care has no momentum". But almost always, those observations are formulated based on events of the past and sloppily extrapolated to imply events of the future, often to embarrassing effect: see also, New Hampshire, the 15-day infatuation with Sarah Palin, the Straight Talk express being left for dead somewhere in the summer of 2007, the overreaction to "Bittergate" and the whole lot, and the naive assumption that Obama's high-60's approval ratings represented a paradigm shift and not a honeymoon period that new Presidents almost always experience. I also believe that the media can, in the short term, amplify and sometimes even create waves of momentum. But almost always only in the short term.
For the MSM, momentum is a living thing that has no relationship to the things it moves. It's an arbitrary force of the universe - sort of like God - which joyfully skews a chain of events one way or another. And when it gets bored with one direction, it shifts to another. And none of this has anything to do with the importance or truth of the matter it has seized upon. Why is this the MSM approach? Because even if absolutely nothing is happening, something must be made to happen for there to be news. Even if it is entirely illusory.
Finally, Nate:
They're at what I believe may be something of a 'trough' or 'bottom' as far as this media-induced momentum goes. By some point in August, the media will at least have tired of the present storyline and may in fact be looking for excuses to declare a shift in momentum and report that some relatively ordinary moment is in fact the "game changer" that the Democrats needed.
When what someone thinks might happen becomes the news, the news becomes entirely detached from reality. In other words, when we read the news, we're in fairyland.
Some wisdom from Nate Silver:
Firstly, the media environment has become very treacherous. There's been all sorts of piling on, for instance, about last night's satisfactory press conference -- this is almost certainly the most sustained stretch of bad coverage for Obama since back when Jeremiah Wright became a household name after the Ohio primary. I don't think the media has a liberal bias or a conservative bias so much as it has a bias toward overreacting to short-term trends and a tendency toward groupthink.
In the MSM, everything is equally important, and everything changes everything forever. Picture a perfectly balanced seesaw. A tiny breeze blows and the seesaw tilts ever so slightly toward one side. The entire MSM jumps on that side and drives it into the ground. They're not reporting. They're screaming to get your attention.
Back to Nate:
The media likes to talk about "momentum". It usually talks about the momentum in the present tense -- as in, "health care has no momentum". But almost always, those observations are formulated based on events of the past and sloppily extrapolated to imply events of the future, often to embarrassing effect: see also, New Hampshire, the 15-day infatuation with Sarah Palin, the Straight Talk express being left for dead somewhere in the summer of 2007, the overreaction to "Bittergate" and the whole lot, and the naive assumption that Obama's high-60's approval ratings represented a paradigm shift and not a honeymoon period that new Presidents almost always experience. I also believe that the media can, in the short term, amplify and sometimes even create waves of momentum. But almost always only in the short term.
For the MSM, momentum is a living thing that has no relationship to the things it moves. It's an arbitrary force of the universe - sort of like God - which joyfully skews a chain of events one way or another. And when it gets bored with one direction, it shifts to another. And none of this has anything to do with the importance or truth of the matter it has seized upon. Why is this the MSM approach? Because even if absolutely nothing is happening, something must be made to happen for there to be news. Even if it is entirely illusory.
Finally, Nate:
They're at what I believe may be something of a 'trough' or 'bottom' as far as this media-induced momentum goes. By some point in August, the media will at least have tired of the present storyline and may in fact be looking for excuses to declare a shift in momentum and report that some relatively ordinary moment is in fact the "game changer" that the Democrats needed.
When what someone thinks might happen becomes the news, the news becomes entirely detached from reality. In other words, when we read the news, we're in fairyland.
The Safety Net - Cracks in Unemployment System Widen Under Strain of Recession - Series - NYTimes.com
Grand Prairie officers on leave after racist Obama e-mail circulated | Top Stories | Star-Telegram.com
Thursday, July 23, 2009
SURPRISE
Some interesting comments about the Middle East:
We had to hate the humiliating disgrace of the homelessness of our people. We had to hate, as any nation worth the name must always hate, the rule of the foreigner, rule unjust and unjustifiable per se. Foreign rule in the land of our ancestors, in our own country.
Our enemies called us terrorists, and yet we were not terrorists. The historical and political origins of the term "terror" prove that it cannot be applied to a revolutionary war of liberation. A revolution may give birth to what we call terror, as happened in France. But the revolution itself is not terror, and terror is not the revolution.
The goal on the one side is the overthrow of armed tyranny; on the other side is the perpetuation of that tyranny. We used physical force because we were faced with physical force.
What Palestinian wrote these lines?
Menachem Begin.
Some of what he wrote here is fascinating. He condemns British rule in "our own country" - yet he had no country until the British left. (Although he could certainly refer to Palestine as the land of his ancestors.) He claims Israel was fighting a revolution against Britain. Yet Britain's control of Palestine, handed to it by the League of Nations, was not the typical colonial situation. Palestine was a burden to England, and provided nothing in return. The Israeli victory was not a revolution; it was a conquest, first by diplomatic means within the UN, then by military means which were genuinely terrorist, of territory held by a nation which by then did not want it.
This is by no means to minimize the Israeli accomplishment. It's just that it wasn't quite what Begin said it was.
What Begin legitimately could have said, and may have said elsewhere, was that the Irgun used terror tactics against the British - ambushing them in alleys, and blowing up buildings they were in - because that was the only weapon they had to counter the military power of the British army. The British would not have said they were fighting "a war against terror" - a concept which makes absolutely no sense. They would have said they were fighting an independence movement, just as they did against the Northern Irish. That is clearly what Israel is fighting now, while freely condemning "terrorism" without acknowledging the critical role the same tactics played in establishing the State of Israel.
The Arabs hand them a cover for this duplicity by saying they want to destroy Israel. The Irgun never wanted to destroy England, so there is a linguistic distinction which works in Israel's favor. But Arab use of language is traditionally hyperbolic. Although I am sure there are Palestinians who specifically want to kill Israels, I suspect that what most Arabs mean by what they say is that they want to drive the Zionists out of the Middle East. And that is precisely what the Irgun wanted to do to the British.
It's okay for the Israelis to be dishonest about this. It is not okay to be taken in by it. When this fight began, it was a heroic struggle by underdog Israelis against an Arab sea. That's not what it is now. It is now a pathetic struggle by underdog Palestinians against overwhelming Israeli arms - although nuclear-armed Israel never stops insisting it remains the underdog.
I would have more respect for Israel if it would admit that what it is doing is a grab for land. (Nothing new, by the way - Ben Gurion intended to expand Israel's borders from the moment statehood was declared.) Whether they justify it on religious grounds or on the need for security, I wouldn't agree but I would understand. But don't claim you're the victim. It doesn't wash anymore. Anyway, the British never did.
We had to hate the humiliating disgrace of the homelessness of our people. We had to hate, as any nation worth the name must always hate, the rule of the foreigner, rule unjust and unjustifiable per se. Foreign rule in the land of our ancestors, in our own country.
Our enemies called us terrorists, and yet we were not terrorists. The historical and political origins of the term "terror" prove that it cannot be applied to a revolutionary war of liberation. A revolution may give birth to what we call terror, as happened in France. But the revolution itself is not terror, and terror is not the revolution.
The goal on the one side is the overthrow of armed tyranny; on the other side is the perpetuation of that tyranny. We used physical force because we were faced with physical force.
What Palestinian wrote these lines?
Menachem Begin.
Some of what he wrote here is fascinating. He condemns British rule in "our own country" - yet he had no country until the British left. (Although he could certainly refer to Palestine as the land of his ancestors.) He claims Israel was fighting a revolution against Britain. Yet Britain's control of Palestine, handed to it by the League of Nations, was not the typical colonial situation. Palestine was a burden to England, and provided nothing in return. The Israeli victory was not a revolution; it was a conquest, first by diplomatic means within the UN, then by military means which were genuinely terrorist, of territory held by a nation which by then did not want it.
This is by no means to minimize the Israeli accomplishment. It's just that it wasn't quite what Begin said it was.
What Begin legitimately could have said, and may have said elsewhere, was that the Irgun used terror tactics against the British - ambushing them in alleys, and blowing up buildings they were in - because that was the only weapon they had to counter the military power of the British army. The British would not have said they were fighting "a war against terror" - a concept which makes absolutely no sense. They would have said they were fighting an independence movement, just as they did against the Northern Irish. That is clearly what Israel is fighting now, while freely condemning "terrorism" without acknowledging the critical role the same tactics played in establishing the State of Israel.
The Arabs hand them a cover for this duplicity by saying they want to destroy Israel. The Irgun never wanted to destroy England, so there is a linguistic distinction which works in Israel's favor. But Arab use of language is traditionally hyperbolic. Although I am sure there are Palestinians who specifically want to kill Israels, I suspect that what most Arabs mean by what they say is that they want to drive the Zionists out of the Middle East. And that is precisely what the Irgun wanted to do to the British.
It's okay for the Israelis to be dishonest about this. It is not okay to be taken in by it. When this fight began, it was a heroic struggle by underdog Israelis against an Arab sea. That's not what it is now. It is now a pathetic struggle by underdog Palestinians against overwhelming Israeli arms - although nuclear-armed Israel never stops insisting it remains the underdog.
I would have more respect for Israel if it would admit that what it is doing is a grab for land. (Nothing new, by the way - Ben Gurion intended to expand Israel's borders from the moment statehood was declared.) Whether they justify it on religious grounds or on the need for security, I wouldn't agree but I would understand. But don't claim you're the victim. It doesn't wash anymore. Anyway, the British never did.
Cambridge Police Union President Stephen Killion "Disgraced" That Obama "Is Our Commander-In-Chief"
Cambridge Police Union President Stephen Killion "Disgraced" That Obama "Is Our Commander-In-Chief"
Is there no stupid, inconsequential incident or fact that someone will not make into a political ploy? With these constant relentless attacks, it's a wonder anyone can sleep. There has got to be a cathartic event which puts an end to this. No matter how awful it might be, it's better than things as they are.
But of course I'm thrilled that the president of the Cambridge Police Patrol Officer's Association - some Boston shmuck - says that he is "disgraced that (Obama) is our commander-in-chief." It's a matter of earth-shaking importance that the world knows what he thinks. I value his opinion highly, as in the great tradition of Joe the Plumber. But I wonder, even if Obama was wrong to say what he said, who in the world really gives a shit beyond this egomaniac and the other nigger-haters he's communicating with. Let's not forget Boston's history on this point - nor forget the townie resentment of Harvard toffs, never mind a black man pretending to be white.
Shades of Louise Day Hicks. This stuff is so old it's mouldering. And maybe the post 9/11 worship of cops and firemen has gone a little too far. So far as I know, 9/11 didn't increase their brain power.
Is there no stupid, inconsequential incident or fact that someone will not make into a political ploy? With these constant relentless attacks, it's a wonder anyone can sleep. There has got to be a cathartic event which puts an end to this. No matter how awful it might be, it's better than things as they are.
But of course I'm thrilled that the president of the Cambridge Police Patrol Officer's Association - some Boston shmuck - says that he is "disgraced that (Obama) is our commander-in-chief." It's a matter of earth-shaking importance that the world knows what he thinks. I value his opinion highly, as in the great tradition of Joe the Plumber. But I wonder, even if Obama was wrong to say what he said, who in the world really gives a shit beyond this egomaniac and the other nigger-haters he's communicating with. Let's not forget Boston's history on this point - nor forget the townie resentment of Harvard toffs, never mind a black man pretending to be white.
Shades of Louise Day Hicks. This stuff is so old it's mouldering. And maybe the post 9/11 worship of cops and firemen has gone a little too far. So far as I know, 9/11 didn't increase their brain power.
Conservative Activist Forwards Racist Pic Showing Obama As Witch Doctor | TPMMuckraker
Conservative Activist Forwards Racist Pic Showing Obama As Witch Doctor | TPMMuckraker
Since I previously put up a post with dumb comments, I thought I'd balance it with a post with some very good observations in the comments.
Since I previously put up a post with dumb comments, I thought I'd balance it with a post with some very good observations in the comments.
Blue Dog Dems Cashing In On Clout
Blue Dog Dems Cashing In On Clout
I remember the excitement when Democrats started winning in red states. I guess we all forgot to remember that they did it by being better at red state stuff than the Republican.
I remember the excitement when Democrats started winning in red states. I guess we all forgot to remember that they did it by being better at red state stuff than the Republican.
Conservative Activist Forwards Racist Pic Showing Obama As Witch Doctor | TPMMuckraker
Conservative Activist Forwards Racist Pic Showing Obama As Witch Doctor | TPMMuckraker
So many really good people out there ...
I have been saying for a long time that what we are seeing now is the resumption of the Civil War. But that was based on the economic and overall social views of Republicans being so close to what was going on in the South before the war. I took the South at its word when it said it had conquered racism. But I don't believe that anymore. I think race is a major factor in radical Republicanism. Other than Clarence Thomas', their Uncle Tom cover story. Did you ever wonder why Colin Powell made so little dent in the Party, and why Condoleeza Rice is never mentioned anymore? Because they're gone from power, and good riddance. No need to tolerate them any further.
So many really good people out there ...
I have been saying for a long time that what we are seeing now is the resumption of the Civil War. But that was based on the economic and overall social views of Republicans being so close to what was going on in the South before the war. I took the South at its word when it said it had conquered racism. But I don't believe that anymore. I think race is a major factor in radical Republicanism. Other than Clarence Thomas', their Uncle Tom cover story. Did you ever wonder why Colin Powell made so little dent in the Party, and why Condoleeza Rice is never mentioned anymore? Because they're gone from power, and good riddance. No need to tolerate them any further.
Pam's House Blend:: Sen. Claire McCaskill: a yes vote on Thune would have opened door to gay marriage in Missouri
Pam's House Blend:: Sen. Claire McCaskill: a yes vote on Thune would have opened door to gay marriage in Missouri
OK, so now you have to ask: does McCaskill mean it, or is she simply cleverly manipulating her doofus constituency?
OK, so now you have to ask: does McCaskill mean it, or is she simply cleverly manipulating her doofus constituency?
Minnesota Independent: News. Politics. Media. � Bachmann joins Paulsen on GOP’s most-vulnerable-incumbents list
Minnesota Independent: News. Politics. Media. � Bachmann joins Paulsen on GOP’s most-vulnerable-incumbents list
Somebody in the GOP has their head on straight.
Somebody in the GOP has their head on straight.
JUSTIFIED?
Sen. Inhofe on how they're going to defeat health care reform:
"But every day, they lose votes, because people find out what it is, what it’s going to do, and what it’s not going to do. When you tell people that the mortality rate in Canada is 25% higher for breast cancer, 18% higher for prostate cancer, you know, they say why in the world would we emulate a system like that?"
In view of the fact that no one, at this point, is proposing a system anything like Canada's, the question has to be: how many people can Inhofe confuse? We know how much contempt Inhofe has for American intelligence. (About as much as I have for his.) Exactly how much of that is justified?
"But every day, they lose votes, because people find out what it is, what it’s going to do, and what it’s not going to do. When you tell people that the mortality rate in Canada is 25% higher for breast cancer, 18% higher for prostate cancer, you know, they say why in the world would we emulate a system like that?"
In view of the fact that no one, at this point, is proposing a system anything like Canada's, the question has to be: how many people can Inhofe confuse? We know how much contempt Inhofe has for American intelligence. (About as much as I have for his.) Exactly how much of that is justified?
IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE?
What are the chances for a putsch in America? It's hard to tell. Given the media's penchant for highlighting one nut as if he or she were representative of millions, it's almost impossible to draw a conclusion from what you see.
But 30% of Americans supported Bush at his lowest ebb. 90,000,000 people. How many of those are angry enough now to support a putsch? Let's say 1%. 900,000. More than enough.
How many of those are armed and in touch with putschist groups? I have no idea. Anybody know?
But 30% of Americans supported Bush at his lowest ebb. 90,000,000 people. How many of those are angry enough now to support a putsch? Let's say 1%. 900,000. More than enough.
How many of those are armed and in touch with putschist groups? I have no idea. Anybody know?
Think Progress � Steele urges Democrats to pass health care bill without Republicans.
Think Progress � Steele urges Democrats to pass health care bill without Republicans.
I'm clipping this not for what Steele said, but for the quality of the comments. I'm not sure whether I should be depressed or delighted. But I guess I'm glad to know that you don't have to be smart or civil to think like a Democrat.
I'm clipping this not for what Steele said, but for the quality of the comments. I'm not sure whether I should be depressed or delighted. But I guess I'm glad to know that you don't have to be smart or civil to think like a Democrat.
CRAP
You learn from the internet how many bright articulate people there are out there - and also how many stupid, ignorant or mentally ill. For people who have lived their lives trying to avoid the latter, the internet is a heavy reality check. You always knew that real intelligence was a limited commodity, but when you can easily assess the odds, it's hard to believe that bright people can get anything done (except for their own economic success) against the burgeoning horde of idiots.
TV is another continuum. Since the advent of cable and reality TV, stupid and ignorant have entirely dominated the medium (particularly including political commentary.) I don't know how anyone with any higher learning can watch TV at all. Okay, sports. The medium has to be assumed to be reflective of the population, which is a terrifying and hopeless thought. Although I wonder whether one of the reasons it is so dumb is that bright people have gone to the internet and divorced themselves from TV.
Nah. It was dumb before there was an internet. I begin to have some sympathy for the C Street guys, because I begin to understand how rewarding it is to isolate yourself from people who don't believe what you do - even if what you believe is a load of crap.
TV is another continuum. Since the advent of cable and reality TV, stupid and ignorant have entirely dominated the medium (particularly including political commentary.) I don't know how anyone with any higher learning can watch TV at all. Okay, sports. The medium has to be assumed to be reflective of the population, which is a terrifying and hopeless thought. Although I wonder whether one of the reasons it is so dumb is that bright people have gone to the internet and divorced themselves from TV.
Nah. It was dumb before there was an internet. I begin to have some sympathy for the C Street guys, because I begin to understand how rewarding it is to isolate yourself from people who don't believe what you do - even if what you believe is a load of crap.
THE CHIP AWAY WORLD
Obama's approval rating is dropping. That is inevitable as he morphs from a promise into a reality.
It's hard to know exactly whom he's losing. Certainly some progressives don't like what he's up to, as I mentioned in a previous post. So some of the loss could be attributed to them - but that is not a meaningful loss in the short term.
Republicans who are true believers but were disgusted with Bush will go back to their party, regardless of issues. They just don't think like Democrats, and they never will.
He will lose some because the economy isn't improving fast enough. I doubt that will be a large number. For many people, the economic situation is now tolerable, stabilized. Of those who have been hit hard - lost jobs, etc. - most are likely to be focused on policy, and they are not seeing any policy from Republicans. They may be dissatisfied with Obama, but to this point I doubt they see any acceptable alternative. And they are not likely ever to see one from Republicans.
The cost of health care? The cost of the bailouts? The threat of rising taxes? That's probably a big one. But until these issues shake out, there will be no rise in taxes, and no one knows now whether there actually will be. This dissatisfaction is subject to correction - or subject to becoming much worse.
But the real reason his popularity is slipping is that it is inevitable. With opponents chipping away at him daily, whether with meaningful points or not, and with the media (ever looking for controversy) amplifying all this, he has to be losing points. Then, too, the newness is gone. The public now pays attention only to big Obama news or scandal.
There's a fundamental problem with Obama's approach: He has put himself out front on all issues. While he has been very effective with this, there will be diminishing returns as people begin to tire of seeing him, and as America returns to seeming normality. The reaction will be: shit, it's HIM again. What the fuck does he want from us now?
So Obama's view has been correct: short of some utterly fresh triumph or disaster, he has at best a year to get things done.
What I'm trying to imagine is what his presidency will look like when that year is over and he has to stop putting forward huge new proposals because no one wants to hear them and he hasn't got the votes.
What I hope he will do is quietly and somewhat under the radar move the country to the left. Executive orders, that sort of thing. But I have no reason to expect that from him. He isn't all that progressive, actually.
So I retreat to my usual conclusion. We'll see. Oh - and one other note. War changes everything.
It's hard to know exactly whom he's losing. Certainly some progressives don't like what he's up to, as I mentioned in a previous post. So some of the loss could be attributed to them - but that is not a meaningful loss in the short term.
Republicans who are true believers but were disgusted with Bush will go back to their party, regardless of issues. They just don't think like Democrats, and they never will.
He will lose some because the economy isn't improving fast enough. I doubt that will be a large number. For many people, the economic situation is now tolerable, stabilized. Of those who have been hit hard - lost jobs, etc. - most are likely to be focused on policy, and they are not seeing any policy from Republicans. They may be dissatisfied with Obama, but to this point I doubt they see any acceptable alternative. And they are not likely ever to see one from Republicans.
The cost of health care? The cost of the bailouts? The threat of rising taxes? That's probably a big one. But until these issues shake out, there will be no rise in taxes, and no one knows now whether there actually will be. This dissatisfaction is subject to correction - or subject to becoming much worse.
But the real reason his popularity is slipping is that it is inevitable. With opponents chipping away at him daily, whether with meaningful points or not, and with the media (ever looking for controversy) amplifying all this, he has to be losing points. Then, too, the newness is gone. The public now pays attention only to big Obama news or scandal.
There's a fundamental problem with Obama's approach: He has put himself out front on all issues. While he has been very effective with this, there will be diminishing returns as people begin to tire of seeing him, and as America returns to seeming normality. The reaction will be: shit, it's HIM again. What the fuck does he want from us now?
So Obama's view has been correct: short of some utterly fresh triumph or disaster, he has at best a year to get things done.
What I'm trying to imagine is what his presidency will look like when that year is over and he has to stop putting forward huge new proposals because no one wants to hear them and he hasn't got the votes.
What I hope he will do is quietly and somewhat under the radar move the country to the left. Executive orders, that sort of thing. But I have no reason to expect that from him. He isn't all that progressive, actually.
So I retreat to my usual conclusion. We'll see. Oh - and one other note. War changes everything.
Political Party Time � Fundraising while shooting
Political Party Time � Fundraising while shooting
Can you imagine what would happen if the Democrats put restrictions on owning golf clubs?
Can you imagine what would happen if the Democrats put restrictions on owning golf clubs?
Leader Of GOP Health Care “Solutions Group” Says GOP Won’t Offer Health Care Bill | The Plum Line
Leader Of GOP Health Care “Solutions Group” Says GOP Won’t Offer Health Care Bill | The Plum Line
All right, here is the proof: conservatism at its best. Why should Republicans offer a health plan? If it ain't broke, don't fix it. It would have shaken my world view to its foundations if they had come up with a plan. My only question: why is anyone surprised?
All right, here is the proof: conservatism at its best. Why should Republicans offer a health plan? If it ain't broke, don't fix it. It would have shaken my world view to its foundations if they had come up with a plan. My only question: why is anyone surprised?
THE EXPLAINER
Obama's greatest talent is said to be his ability to explain policy clearly and convincingly to the uninitiated. He's doing a hell of a job explaining health care right now.
But there are three areas in which he has not made any attempt to explain himself: his constant handouts to the banks, his continuation of Bush secrecy and his inexplicable handling of "terrorists".
The first of those could be a Republican issue, but truthfully that party must be secretly thrilled. While they call Obama socialist he is turning oligopolistic, taking money from the poor and giving to the rich. For Republicans this is a problem only when they need votes.
But these are three huge progressive issues, and progressives are capable of comprehending the truth should Obama decide to tell it.
I'm sure his calculation is that he won't lose progressives to any of the horrors the Republicans are likely to offer in 2012. But that is a bad miscalculation.
Obama is now draining political capital at a high rate, and he's right to do it on the issues he's chosen. But the shit will hit the fan in 2010 when he loses a lot of Congressional seats and action becomes impossible. What's he gonna do then? Give speeches about nothing?
Obama was elected in part to help America decide what kind of country it wanted to be. Sure, health care is important, but it's not definitive. The three issues I mentioned - limits on raptor capitalism, transparency and civil rights - ARE definitive. Maybe progressives have nowhere else to go, but if he expects them to vote for him out of fear he is doing exactly what Bush did. He may get their votes, but he won't get their trust - and he is going to need it.
But there are three areas in which he has not made any attempt to explain himself: his constant handouts to the banks, his continuation of Bush secrecy and his inexplicable handling of "terrorists".
The first of those could be a Republican issue, but truthfully that party must be secretly thrilled. While they call Obama socialist he is turning oligopolistic, taking money from the poor and giving to the rich. For Republicans this is a problem only when they need votes.
But these are three huge progressive issues, and progressives are capable of comprehending the truth should Obama decide to tell it.
I'm sure his calculation is that he won't lose progressives to any of the horrors the Republicans are likely to offer in 2012. But that is a bad miscalculation.
Obama is now draining political capital at a high rate, and he's right to do it on the issues he's chosen. But the shit will hit the fan in 2010 when he loses a lot of Congressional seats and action becomes impossible. What's he gonna do then? Give speeches about nothing?
Obama was elected in part to help America decide what kind of country it wanted to be. Sure, health care is important, but it's not definitive. The three issues I mentioned - limits on raptor capitalism, transparency and civil rights - ARE definitive. Maybe progressives have nowhere else to go, but if he expects them to vote for him out of fear he is doing exactly what Bush did. He may get their votes, but he won't get their trust - and he is going to need it.
Tuesday, July 21, 2009
THE CON
Last week an investigation found that 45 of the 83 factories that built iPhones and iPods in 2008 weren't paying valid overtime rates, and that 23 weren't even paying some of their workers China's minimum wage.
When even the counterculture idols screw workers, you feel like surrendering. Everything is a con, isn't it.
When even the counterculture idols screw workers, you feel like surrendering. Everything is a con, isn't it.
FABULISTS
Politics is about control of the social order. If you like the social order as it is - because you're well positioned in it, or you like the future options it presents - you will want to keep it as it is. Ultimately, your ideal goal is to destroy any impetus for change, as well as anybody behind that impetus, and also any person or entity who conceivably might in the future develop a threat to the order. The only human growth you will accept must fit within the order as it is.
The methods by which you do that destruction - up to murder and war - depend on what society will tolerate, and on your wise judgment as to what actions might in themselves precipitate a change in the order.
In this sense, there is no difference between American conservatives and Iranian ayatollahs. Their goals are exactly the same.
If you're good at it, the only change you are likely to see is the unforeseen result of some process or invention, or some other string of events over which you have no control. A wise conservative will accept such change and, assuming he is still well positioned, shift his ground slightly to defend the new status quo.
Neither American nor Iranian conservatives are inclined to do that. They will fight to the death to keep things exactly as they are (or as they imagine they are, of which more later). The Iranians have the advantage there, since there is nothing stopping them from using maximum force. At present, American conservatives either do not have that option or, having it, have not seized it. There are plenty of them, however, who will seize it, or try to, before the order much mutates.
Both American and Iranian conservatives, however, go much further than the definition of conservative dictates. For them, the current order is not adequate. They want to go back to some alleged earlier order - the pre-war Southern oligopoly, the imagined purity of the American revolution, the English feudal state, or the Kingdom of God as it supposedly was in Biblical times. The order they want to go back to probably never existed as they conceive of it - but they are not scholars of these wished-for regimes; they do not know what life in them was really like, but are transfixed by a sort of Disney version of history. It is for that vision that they will murder or go to war.
For a long while, I had a very hard time understanding how al Qaeda, which wants to return to the 12th century, accommodated itself to satellite phones. But if you understand that the desired state is not the state of the world but the state of the social order, the quandary dissolves.
To call these people conservative is far from accurate. But you can't call them radicals either, because the word "radical" is assumed, probably inaccurately, to refer to people who want to change the future, not return to the past. So there is no overarching word for these people. I, therefore, propose to call them "fabulists" - that is, people who are devoted to the extreme to a schema that has never existed except inside their minds. They are story tellers, except that they are telling the story to themselves. And this, to the extent that I understand psychology, seems to me to qualify them as delusional.
The ranks of fabulists include liberals as well - most particularly including me. We want to go back to the 1960's which we imagine as a progressive time. On the whole, the way things worked out, the 60's were anything but progressive.
However, a lot of changes in the social order were put in motion in that time, even though they were not achieved then. They were forward looking changes - they did not look back, because their ideal had never existed before. Many of them have flowered only recently; for most of them progress was made incrementally and only by catching conservatives off guard. In the last eight years, there has been no progressive movement other than changes spun off by new technology.
So I, too, want to go back to a time which never existed - a time I imagine in the dust of the hippie movement when everyone had at least some wish to improve the lives of others. A time destroyed by the Me Generation, whose sway over the social order, I'm sorry to say, is far more profound than anything flower children wrought.
Me me me me me. I want. I don't want. Only becoming "we" by agglomerating "I"'s, sharing only selfishness. If you want an explanation for the ascendence of Bush and Cheney, that is as far as you need to look.
The methods by which you do that destruction - up to murder and war - depend on what society will tolerate, and on your wise judgment as to what actions might in themselves precipitate a change in the order.
In this sense, there is no difference between American conservatives and Iranian ayatollahs. Their goals are exactly the same.
If you're good at it, the only change you are likely to see is the unforeseen result of some process or invention, or some other string of events over which you have no control. A wise conservative will accept such change and, assuming he is still well positioned, shift his ground slightly to defend the new status quo.
Neither American nor Iranian conservatives are inclined to do that. They will fight to the death to keep things exactly as they are (or as they imagine they are, of which more later). The Iranians have the advantage there, since there is nothing stopping them from using maximum force. At present, American conservatives either do not have that option or, having it, have not seized it. There are plenty of them, however, who will seize it, or try to, before the order much mutates.
Both American and Iranian conservatives, however, go much further than the definition of conservative dictates. For them, the current order is not adequate. They want to go back to some alleged earlier order - the pre-war Southern oligopoly, the imagined purity of the American revolution, the English feudal state, or the Kingdom of God as it supposedly was in Biblical times. The order they want to go back to probably never existed as they conceive of it - but they are not scholars of these wished-for regimes; they do not know what life in them was really like, but are transfixed by a sort of Disney version of history. It is for that vision that they will murder or go to war.
For a long while, I had a very hard time understanding how al Qaeda, which wants to return to the 12th century, accommodated itself to satellite phones. But if you understand that the desired state is not the state of the world but the state of the social order, the quandary dissolves.
To call these people conservative is far from accurate. But you can't call them radicals either, because the word "radical" is assumed, probably inaccurately, to refer to people who want to change the future, not return to the past. So there is no overarching word for these people. I, therefore, propose to call them "fabulists" - that is, people who are devoted to the extreme to a schema that has never existed except inside their minds. They are story tellers, except that they are telling the story to themselves. And this, to the extent that I understand psychology, seems to me to qualify them as delusional.
The ranks of fabulists include liberals as well - most particularly including me. We want to go back to the 1960's which we imagine as a progressive time. On the whole, the way things worked out, the 60's were anything but progressive.
However, a lot of changes in the social order were put in motion in that time, even though they were not achieved then. They were forward looking changes - they did not look back, because their ideal had never existed before. Many of them have flowered only recently; for most of them progress was made incrementally and only by catching conservatives off guard. In the last eight years, there has been no progressive movement other than changes spun off by new technology.
So I, too, want to go back to a time which never existed - a time I imagine in the dust of the hippie movement when everyone had at least some wish to improve the lives of others. A time destroyed by the Me Generation, whose sway over the social order, I'm sorry to say, is far more profound than anything flower children wrought.
Me me me me me. I want. I don't want. Only becoming "we" by agglomerating "I"'s, sharing only selfishness. If you want an explanation for the ascendence of Bush and Cheney, that is as far as you need to look.
PROBABLY ME
Watching the stream of what I consider to be insane statements coming from public Republicans - and hearing nothing from any Republican which I consider sane - I begin to believe that either they are aliens or I am. Not from another country. From another planet.
Don't worry. It's probably me.
Don't worry. It's probably me.
Op-Ed Columnist - Liberal Suicide March - NYTimes.com
Op-Ed Columnist - Liberal Suicide March - NYTimes.com
If God were truly just, He'd take away Brooks' health coverage and THEN tell him to write about liberals.
If God were truly just, He'd take away Brooks' health coverage and THEN tell him to write about liberals.
East Jerusalem Settlements: Mike Huckabee Joins The Fray, Will Broadcast From Disputed Site
East Jerusalem Settlements: Mike Huckabee Joins The Fray, Will Broadcast From Disputed Site
Anybody know why Huckabee is in on this?
Well, sure. He's the ambassador from Hageeland.
I hope the next time he runs for president someone actually goes after his religious beliefs. I don't believe the country will tolerate them any more.
Anybody know why Huckabee is in on this?
Well, sure. He's the ambassador from Hageeland.
I hope the next time he runs for president someone actually goes after his religious beliefs. I don't believe the country will tolerate them any more.
Revolutionary Guards Crush Dissent and Widen Control in Iran - NYTimes.com
Revolutionary Guards Crush Dissent and Widen Control in Iran - NYTimes.com
They sound like Russian and Chinese Communists. If this article is correct and the Revolutionary Guard is so totally in control of Iran, no internal revolution can possibly succeed unless it brings a large part of the Revolutionary Guard with it. And considering their perks, why would they change sides?
This is truly sad.
They sound like Russian and Chinese Communists. If this article is correct and the Revolutionary Guard is so totally in control of Iran, no internal revolution can possibly succeed unless it brings a large part of the Revolutionary Guard with it. And considering their perks, why would they change sides?
This is truly sad.
BORING
Must be really boring in Iran, these days, huh? Since the media have dropped the story like a putrid tomato.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Carrie Prejean Book Deal: "Still Standing" Due Out In November
Carrie Prejean Book Deal: "Still Standing" Due Out In November
It has not yet been determined whether Ms. Prejean can read, let alone write. But this is a Regnery project - Regnery being the publishing house which puts out whatever the right wing has to say. Unfortunately, we have to assume there is an audience for this non-story.
Is there a liberal house out there which publishes crap? If so, I have a story to tell about how when I tried to call Obama he wouldn't pick up the phone.
It has not yet been determined whether Ms. Prejean can read, let alone write. But this is a Regnery project - Regnery being the publishing house which puts out whatever the right wing has to say. Unfortunately, we have to assume there is an audience for this non-story.
Is there a liberal house out there which publishes crap? If so, I have a story to tell about how when I tried to call Obama he wouldn't pick up the phone.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
DUMBED DOWN
When bad things happen to good people, the usual theological explanation is either:
1) God knows what's good for you better than you do, in which case why bother to pray? Or
2) God is testing you - in which case you need to do a better job of praying.
Focusing on the second:
The point of prayer is to learn and demonstrate humility. But humility before God is supposed to translate to humility before your fellow man. Except in very few cases, it no longer does. Most people consider their praying a source of pride.
The reason there is so much thought devoted to religion is - where it isn't an institution seeking to control you - because understanding it is difficult. Nobody gets that either, these days. Like everything else, religion has been dumbed down.
You would think that Catholicism had it right - that religion is too complex to trust to the average guy; it had to be left to priests and monks who had the time and the training to get into the subtleties. Unfortunately the church discovered that the number of people who had the capacity was extremely small. Since they needed priests in every hamlet in order to keep control and to keep donations coming in, they filled the ranks with people who knew no better than anyone else - some of whom had particular social problems.
That's why Luther tacked his theses to the door. The thing that Luther missed, though, was that he was smarter than most. And since most had no ability to comprehend religion, Luther wound up a substitute Pope.
You see? The whole thing is impossible. But businesswise it's terrific.
1) God knows what's good for you better than you do, in which case why bother to pray? Or
2) God is testing you - in which case you need to do a better job of praying.
Focusing on the second:
The point of prayer is to learn and demonstrate humility. But humility before God is supposed to translate to humility before your fellow man. Except in very few cases, it no longer does. Most people consider their praying a source of pride.
The reason there is so much thought devoted to religion is - where it isn't an institution seeking to control you - because understanding it is difficult. Nobody gets that either, these days. Like everything else, religion has been dumbed down.
You would think that Catholicism had it right - that religion is too complex to trust to the average guy; it had to be left to priests and monks who had the time and the training to get into the subtleties. Unfortunately the church discovered that the number of people who had the capacity was extremely small. Since they needed priests in every hamlet in order to keep control and to keep donations coming in, they filled the ranks with people who knew no better than anyone else - some of whom had particular social problems.
That's why Luther tacked his theses to the door. The thing that Luther missed, though, was that he was smarter than most. And since most had no ability to comprehend religion, Luther wound up a substitute Pope.
You see? The whole thing is impossible. But businesswise it's terrific.
PROBLEMS
Mark Sanford now says: "It's in the spirit of making good from bad that I am committing to you and the larger family of South Carolinians to use this experience to both trust God in his larger work of changing me, and from my end, to work to becoming a better and more effective leader."
Boy, do I have a lot of problems with that statement.
If you take Sanford at the word of his emails, his involvement in Argentina was glorious! It was not only the best sex but the best interpersonal relating Sanford had ever known. This would seem to meet the definition of "good". So what is the "bad" that he is going to make "good"?
The fact of cheating Sanford was perfectly okay with. It's the concept of cheating - i.e., the rule, meaning other people's opinions - that Sanford has so much trouble with that he's gone back on his knees to his wife, who, considering she was a high-ranking Lazard beancounter AND a Jesus freak, must have brought emotional satisfaction to a whole new level.
God is Sanford's problem - that is, God as his C Street brethren see Him. How sad for Sanford that he believes God is against extravagantly beautiful love. Doug Coe, I'm sure, is a hell of a lot smarter. He uses God against Sanford to get him back to the point where he can be a useful power tool.
This is always a problem when dummies consider religion. Sanford had almost made his escape into honest joy and humility. How awful they've dragged him back in.
Have they actually convinced him that changing Sanford is God's larger work? Is it larger than saving Goldman Sachs, or shooting abortion doctors (apparently God insisted on that, too)? When you really believe that God is going to devote a chunk of His time (does God have time?) to fixing you, you've reached the point where no mirror in the world will hold your image. According to Mark Sanford, he is truly "too big to fail."
Boy, do I have a lot of problems with that statement.
If you take Sanford at the word of his emails, his involvement in Argentina was glorious! It was not only the best sex but the best interpersonal relating Sanford had ever known. This would seem to meet the definition of "good". So what is the "bad" that he is going to make "good"?
The fact of cheating Sanford was perfectly okay with. It's the concept of cheating - i.e., the rule, meaning other people's opinions - that Sanford has so much trouble with that he's gone back on his knees to his wife, who, considering she was a high-ranking Lazard beancounter AND a Jesus freak, must have brought emotional satisfaction to a whole new level.
God is Sanford's problem - that is, God as his C Street brethren see Him. How sad for Sanford that he believes God is against extravagantly beautiful love. Doug Coe, I'm sure, is a hell of a lot smarter. He uses God against Sanford to get him back to the point where he can be a useful power tool.
This is always a problem when dummies consider religion. Sanford had almost made his escape into honest joy and humility. How awful they've dragged him back in.
Have they actually convinced him that changing Sanford is God's larger work? Is it larger than saving Goldman Sachs, or shooting abortion doctors (apparently God insisted on that, too)? When you really believe that God is going to devote a chunk of His time (does God have time?) to fixing you, you've reached the point where no mirror in the world will hold your image. According to Mark Sanford, he is truly "too big to fail."
Celebrating Cronkite while ignoring what he did - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com
Celebrating Cronkite while ignoring what he did - Glenn Greenwald - Salon.com
It is impossible for me to fully express my gratitude for the mere existence of Glenn Greenwald.
It is impossible for me to fully express my gratitude for the mere existence of Glenn Greenwald.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
TEXAS VS. CALIFORNIA
I learn from "On Point" that Texas is booming. But not the average Texan.
What Texas has done is to provide great tax and other incentives to corporations to move there. What it has also done, by keeping taxes low, is to provide less government benefits to its citizens than almost any other state. It has, in fact, become the latest Milton Friedman construct.
Texas is booming because of immigration, but not the Mexican kind. People and companies looking for a completely free market society are finding it there, and doing well with it. This is nothing new. Texas has always been the focus for the most libertarian views (although its societal complications are anything but libertarian). You don't get help from Texas - unless you can help the Texans who have extended help to you. In other words, you've got to be in the club, and money gets you there. Texas libertarianism and self-reliance mostly works when it doesn't exist - that is, when you are part of the oligarchy, and dependent on it. But you are certainly independent of everybody else.
Texas is the focal point of the abandonment of the social contract. It exists for the benefit of rich white men - a category which includes women, blacks, Latinos who manage to behave like rich white men. Race or gender is no obstacle to participation in the Texas miracle, as long as you are a Friedmanite.
This is contrasted with California, which, they say, is in a mess because of its extensive commitment to the social contract and to benefits for all its citizens. This contrast is alleged to be the proof that the social contract is a destructive drag on civilization.
But here's the lie in it: California is not really a social contract state. It has always had divided attitudes; many people theoretically want to extend those benefits, but many people don't want to pay for them. I'm not sure to what extent these are the same people. But those who don't want to pay are essentially Friedmanite, and it is they who - by using the ballot initiative - have brought California to its current pass. They have blocked any meaningful revenue measures. So it's fair to say that while Texas is and always has been Friedmanite, it was necessary in California to destroy the pre-existing social contract, and that is what the Friedmanites have been doing.
So California is at the half-way point. It will either go Friedmanite, or it won't. If it doesn't, Friedmanites will leave the state - leaving its survival in the hands of the relatively few corporations and entrepreneurs with a well developed sense of social obligation. If it does, it will still take fifty years to clear the state of all non-Friedmanite human material. For Friedmanites, either way, Texas is a better bet.
This can be put in a much clearer way: California is (theoretically) progressive and Democratic. Texas is regressive and radically Republican. What happens to each is symptomatic of the current epic battle for the soul of American democracy. And, in the short run, I think Texas will win, because there is no battle going on there. It is as much a safe zone for Friedmanites as Pakistan is for al Qaeda. From Texas, they can - and do - venture out to conquer weaker lands. And they've done a hell of a job of undermining California.
If you want to hear more about this, listen to The Eagles.
What Texas has done is to provide great tax and other incentives to corporations to move there. What it has also done, by keeping taxes low, is to provide less government benefits to its citizens than almost any other state. It has, in fact, become the latest Milton Friedman construct.
Texas is booming because of immigration, but not the Mexican kind. People and companies looking for a completely free market society are finding it there, and doing well with it. This is nothing new. Texas has always been the focus for the most libertarian views (although its societal complications are anything but libertarian). You don't get help from Texas - unless you can help the Texans who have extended help to you. In other words, you've got to be in the club, and money gets you there. Texas libertarianism and self-reliance mostly works when it doesn't exist - that is, when you are part of the oligarchy, and dependent on it. But you are certainly independent of everybody else.
Texas is the focal point of the abandonment of the social contract. It exists for the benefit of rich white men - a category which includes women, blacks, Latinos who manage to behave like rich white men. Race or gender is no obstacle to participation in the Texas miracle, as long as you are a Friedmanite.
This is contrasted with California, which, they say, is in a mess because of its extensive commitment to the social contract and to benefits for all its citizens. This contrast is alleged to be the proof that the social contract is a destructive drag on civilization.
But here's the lie in it: California is not really a social contract state. It has always had divided attitudes; many people theoretically want to extend those benefits, but many people don't want to pay for them. I'm not sure to what extent these are the same people. But those who don't want to pay are essentially Friedmanite, and it is they who - by using the ballot initiative - have brought California to its current pass. They have blocked any meaningful revenue measures. So it's fair to say that while Texas is and always has been Friedmanite, it was necessary in California to destroy the pre-existing social contract, and that is what the Friedmanites have been doing.
So California is at the half-way point. It will either go Friedmanite, or it won't. If it doesn't, Friedmanites will leave the state - leaving its survival in the hands of the relatively few corporations and entrepreneurs with a well developed sense of social obligation. If it does, it will still take fifty years to clear the state of all non-Friedmanite human material. For Friedmanites, either way, Texas is a better bet.
This can be put in a much clearer way: California is (theoretically) progressive and Democratic. Texas is regressive and radically Republican. What happens to each is symptomatic of the current epic battle for the soul of American democracy. And, in the short run, I think Texas will win, because there is no battle going on there. It is as much a safe zone for Friedmanites as Pakistan is for al Qaeda. From Texas, they can - and do - venture out to conquer weaker lands. And they've done a hell of a job of undermining California.
If you want to hear more about this, listen to The Eagles.
Friday, July 17, 2009
Wife of ex-GOP Rep. Pickering claims he had affair
Wife of ex-GOP Rep. Pickering claims he had affair
This C Street connection gets more and more interesting. It's starting to look like they're running a sort of Aztec religion/sex theology. But it's more likely they believe that, since God has put them in office, they can do anything they want to do. Therefore, why should they not have more satisfying sex? As a matter of fact, if they preached what they practice, we all could have fun sex once in a while, right?
This C Street connection gets more and more interesting. It's starting to look like they're running a sort of Aztec religion/sex theology. But it's more likely they believe that, since God has put them in office, they can do anything they want to do. Therefore, why should they not have more satisfying sex? As a matter of fact, if they preached what they practice, we all could have fun sex once in a while, right?
Thursday, July 16, 2009
WE DON'T GET IT
Should Killing Lobsters In Boiling Water Be Outlawed? (VIDEO, POLL)
I own a lot of animals. "Own" is the correct word. I have a legal relationship to my pets. I own them. If my dog bites someone, they're going to sue me because I own him, not because I'm his friend.
Of course, since I am responsible for them, and because I love them, I am going to do everything I can to make sure they are not hurt, or sick, and live the best quality life they possibly can.
But they have no rights.
Like ownership, "rights" is a legal concept. According to the Standard College Dictionary (which is as likely to be correct as any of us), rights - or more correctly, natural rights - are those with which mankind is supposedly endowed by nature. Note the keyword: mankind.
This is the Western conception of rights. Rights are things which humans are to be guaranteed by other humans.
In fact, this is the human conception of rights.
The Jains believe that animals have souls. (If it weren't for the fact that I don't think anything has a soul, based on what I see in my pets, I would have to agree with them.) They, therefore, will not kill an animal. As stated in the Catholic Encyclopedia (I was looking for information in really outre sources):
The sacredness of all kinds of life implied in the doctrine of metempsychosis has been more scrupulously observed in practice by the Jain than by the Brahmin or the Buddhist. The Brahmin tolerates the slaughter of animals for food, to provide offerings for the sacrifice, or to show hospitality to a guest; the Buddhist does not scruple to eat meat prepared for a banquet; but the Jain reprobates meat-food without exception as involving the unlawful taking of life. For similar reasons the Jain does not content himself with straining his drinking water and with remaining at home during the rainy season, when the ground is swarming with lower forms of life, but when he goes forth, he wears a veil before his mouth, and carries a broom with which he sweeps the ground before him to avoid destruction of insect life. The Jainist ascetic allows himself to be bitten by gnats and mosquitoes rather than risk their destruction by brushing them away. Hospitals for animals have been a prominent feature of Jainist benevolence, bordering at times on absurdity. For example, in 1834 there existed in Kutch a temple hospital which supported 5000 rats.
They do this sort of thing because they believe that killing or hurting an animal brings bad karma - not to the animal, but to themselves. In other words, they don't avoid hurting animals because animals have rights. They avoid hurting animals because it is a moral imperative - in humans - not to hurt animals. Again, in other words, it is not what they are entitled to that counts. What counts is your obedience to your own moral imperative. It is not what's in them, but what's in you, that counts.
The Jains do not recognize animals as equals. They recognize them as obligations.
PETA, in their delightfully muddled way, has misthought this whole thing. They don't exactly think animals are equals, but they have rights. (I think of this in the same way I think of certain right wing views - like, for example, Puerto Ricans aren't equals, but they have rights.) They clearly believe animals have a right not to be mistreated. I wonder if they believe - or are coming to believe - that animals have other rights, and what those rights might be. Free speech, for instance? The right to bear arms?
They started out protesting wearing animal furs, moving to the position that animals have a right to keep their furs. (There can't be an absolute human moral imperative not to take furs, since at one time in human history we really needed them. Are we saying that now that we don't need them, since we have synthetics, a new moral imperative has developed? I can't buy that, because I believe moral imperatives are inbred in humans - or are supposed to be, granting that some of us don't seem to have this gene. If it was okay once to use animal skins but not now, this is the kind of situational morality that religions hate.)
Then they moved to not eating animals, and I am quite sure they will ultimately approach the Jain belief - but without understanding the basis for that belief.
This is the problem with most religions. They take a moral imperative, make an assbackward legal rule out of it, and then build an entire legal structure on an essential misconception.
And this I think is the great problem of today - that the focus is on the victim and not on the victimizer. True human beings must understand that doing no harm, or at least no unnecessary harm, is something which they owe to themselves. Nobody gets that anymore, least of all the truly religious as now defined. It is not a matter of animal rights; it is a matter of human moral obligation. Without understanding, and feeling, that obligation, a human being is an imperfect thing.
Which brings me to lobsters. I will bet that the lobster doesn't care how it's killed; it just would rather not be. But I wouldn't boil a lobster - first because I wouldn't eat it in the first place, and second because if I boil it (assuming this causes pain and is not the equivalent of a shot of demerol) I diminish myself. The whole concept of "kosher" is based on this (okay, not with regard to lobsters) - that the animal should be killed in a humane way. That is to some extent to the benefit of the animal, although it will end up dead one way or another. The real benefit, though, is to the slaughterer.
And that's a fundamental thing that is no longer understood.
I own a lot of animals. "Own" is the correct word. I have a legal relationship to my pets. I own them. If my dog bites someone, they're going to sue me because I own him, not because I'm his friend.
Of course, since I am responsible for them, and because I love them, I am going to do everything I can to make sure they are not hurt, or sick, and live the best quality life they possibly can.
But they have no rights.
Like ownership, "rights" is a legal concept. According to the Standard College Dictionary (which is as likely to be correct as any of us), rights - or more correctly, natural rights - are those with which mankind is supposedly endowed by nature. Note the keyword: mankind.
This is the Western conception of rights. Rights are things which humans are to be guaranteed by other humans.
In fact, this is the human conception of rights.
The Jains believe that animals have souls. (If it weren't for the fact that I don't think anything has a soul, based on what I see in my pets, I would have to agree with them.) They, therefore, will not kill an animal. As stated in the Catholic Encyclopedia (I was looking for information in really outre sources):
The sacredness of all kinds of life implied in the doctrine of metempsychosis has been more scrupulously observed in practice by the Jain than by the Brahmin or the Buddhist. The Brahmin tolerates the slaughter of animals for food, to provide offerings for the sacrifice, or to show hospitality to a guest; the Buddhist does not scruple to eat meat prepared for a banquet; but the Jain reprobates meat-food without exception as involving the unlawful taking of life. For similar reasons the Jain does not content himself with straining his drinking water and with remaining at home during the rainy season, when the ground is swarming with lower forms of life, but when he goes forth, he wears a veil before his mouth, and carries a broom with which he sweeps the ground before him to avoid destruction of insect life. The Jainist ascetic allows himself to be bitten by gnats and mosquitoes rather than risk their destruction by brushing them away. Hospitals for animals have been a prominent feature of Jainist benevolence, bordering at times on absurdity. For example, in 1834 there existed in Kutch a temple hospital which supported 5000 rats.
They do this sort of thing because they believe that killing or hurting an animal brings bad karma - not to the animal, but to themselves. In other words, they don't avoid hurting animals because animals have rights. They avoid hurting animals because it is a moral imperative - in humans - not to hurt animals. Again, in other words, it is not what they are entitled to that counts. What counts is your obedience to your own moral imperative. It is not what's in them, but what's in you, that counts.
The Jains do not recognize animals as equals. They recognize them as obligations.
PETA, in their delightfully muddled way, has misthought this whole thing. They don't exactly think animals are equals, but they have rights. (I think of this in the same way I think of certain right wing views - like, for example, Puerto Ricans aren't equals, but they have rights.) They clearly believe animals have a right not to be mistreated. I wonder if they believe - or are coming to believe - that animals have other rights, and what those rights might be. Free speech, for instance? The right to bear arms?
They started out protesting wearing animal furs, moving to the position that animals have a right to keep their furs. (There can't be an absolute human moral imperative not to take furs, since at one time in human history we really needed them. Are we saying that now that we don't need them, since we have synthetics, a new moral imperative has developed? I can't buy that, because I believe moral imperatives are inbred in humans - or are supposed to be, granting that some of us don't seem to have this gene. If it was okay once to use animal skins but not now, this is the kind of situational morality that religions hate.)
Then they moved to not eating animals, and I am quite sure they will ultimately approach the Jain belief - but without understanding the basis for that belief.
This is the problem with most religions. They take a moral imperative, make an assbackward legal rule out of it, and then build an entire legal structure on an essential misconception.
And this I think is the great problem of today - that the focus is on the victim and not on the victimizer. True human beings must understand that doing no harm, or at least no unnecessary harm, is something which they owe to themselves. Nobody gets that anymore, least of all the truly religious as now defined. It is not a matter of animal rights; it is a matter of human moral obligation. Without understanding, and feeling, that obligation, a human being is an imperfect thing.
Which brings me to lobsters. I will bet that the lobster doesn't care how it's killed; it just would rather not be. But I wouldn't boil a lobster - first because I wouldn't eat it in the first place, and second because if I boil it (assuming this causes pain and is not the equivalent of a shot of demerol) I diminish myself. The whole concept of "kosher" is based on this (okay, not with regard to lobsters) - that the animal should be killed in a humane way. That is to some extent to the benefit of the animal, although it will end up dead one way or another. The real benefit, though, is to the slaughterer.
And that's a fundamental thing that is no longer understood.
EERILY REMINISCENT
Some time ago I pointed out that Bush Administration foreign and military policy was very much like Israeli policy, and I wondered which was the chicken and which the egg.
The following (derived from Patrick Tyler's "A World of Trouble") should help answer that question.
In 1967, for a number of reasons, an Egyptian army massed near the Israeli border. US intelligence was of the opinion that Egypt had no intentions of attacking, but some Israeli military (who later became politicians) wanted to stage a pre-emptive strike. They were feeling proud of their new military, and they believed if they took out the Egyptian military now, they would buy twenty years of peace. One of these was Ariel Sharon.
Levi Eshkol, the civilian prime minister, was, on moral grounds, opposed to a pre-emptive strike. Eshkol pointed out that a military victory would not end the conflict, since the Arabs would still be there. He also rejected the concept of Israel living by the sword. In other words, he opposed the militarization of Israeli society.
Lyndon Johnson was opposed as well, but more for practical than moral reasons; he believed Israel would be condemned if it struck before all diplomatic measures had been attempted.
The IDF were so infuriated by Eshkol's hesitation that they came perilously close to a coup, and the press was supporting one. David Ben Gurion essentially prevented it by making the following statement: "An army in a democratic country does not act by its own opinion, and not by the opinions of its military commanders, but by the opinion of the civil government and its orders."
The immediate motivator for the Israeli attack was that the Egyptians had blocked the Straits of Tiran and would not let Israeli traffic through. Johnson promised that he, through the UN, would assemble an international force which would keep the straits open. He insisted Israel give him time to accomplish that, and Eshkol agreed.
And then the head of the Mossad, after a visit to Washington, reported back that the CIA had told him that the US had made no attempts to put together an international force to open the straits and there was no concrete action plan. This was a lie; State, Defense and the White House were making intensive efforts to put the force together, and the Joint Chiefs were planning to dispatch ships.
The question is, who fabricated the lie: Mossad, or the CIA? Or was it a distinction without a difference? Tyler opines that the Mossad chief told the lie to break Eshkol's resistance to pre-emptive war. He basically admitted as much to Robert MacNamara.
And he did break Eshkol. The cabinet voted for war.
At the same time, Walt Rostow, Johnson's national security adviser, was telling Johnson that the other Arab states in the region wanted Israel to take Nasser down, and that the result of an attack would be the democratization of the Arab states and regional cooperation, including Israel. Johnson didn't buy it. He continued to try to avert war. Johnson went so far as to communicate with Nasser, who assured him Egypt would not begin hostilities, and said he was engaged in a war of nerves which would soon be over.
So much of this sounds eerily reminiscent of recent history. The only difference I can see between then and now is that with Iraq there were no Johnsons or Eshkols to make a serious effort to hold back war. (The best we had was weak little Colin Powell.)
As for the results of these wars, was there really a difference? The whole world now lives with the unpleasant consequences of both of them.
The following (derived from Patrick Tyler's "A World of Trouble") should help answer that question.
In 1967, for a number of reasons, an Egyptian army massed near the Israeli border. US intelligence was of the opinion that Egypt had no intentions of attacking, but some Israeli military (who later became politicians) wanted to stage a pre-emptive strike. They were feeling proud of their new military, and they believed if they took out the Egyptian military now, they would buy twenty years of peace. One of these was Ariel Sharon.
Levi Eshkol, the civilian prime minister, was, on moral grounds, opposed to a pre-emptive strike. Eshkol pointed out that a military victory would not end the conflict, since the Arabs would still be there. He also rejected the concept of Israel living by the sword. In other words, he opposed the militarization of Israeli society.
Lyndon Johnson was opposed as well, but more for practical than moral reasons; he believed Israel would be condemned if it struck before all diplomatic measures had been attempted.
The IDF were so infuriated by Eshkol's hesitation that they came perilously close to a coup, and the press was supporting one. David Ben Gurion essentially prevented it by making the following statement: "An army in a democratic country does not act by its own opinion, and not by the opinions of its military commanders, but by the opinion of the civil government and its orders."
The immediate motivator for the Israeli attack was that the Egyptians had blocked the Straits of Tiran and would not let Israeli traffic through. Johnson promised that he, through the UN, would assemble an international force which would keep the straits open. He insisted Israel give him time to accomplish that, and Eshkol agreed.
And then the head of the Mossad, after a visit to Washington, reported back that the CIA had told him that the US had made no attempts to put together an international force to open the straits and there was no concrete action plan. This was a lie; State, Defense and the White House were making intensive efforts to put the force together, and the Joint Chiefs were planning to dispatch ships.
The question is, who fabricated the lie: Mossad, or the CIA? Or was it a distinction without a difference? Tyler opines that the Mossad chief told the lie to break Eshkol's resistance to pre-emptive war. He basically admitted as much to Robert MacNamara.
And he did break Eshkol. The cabinet voted for war.
At the same time, Walt Rostow, Johnson's national security adviser, was telling Johnson that the other Arab states in the region wanted Israel to take Nasser down, and that the result of an attack would be the democratization of the Arab states and regional cooperation, including Israel. Johnson didn't buy it. He continued to try to avert war. Johnson went so far as to communicate with Nasser, who assured him Egypt would not begin hostilities, and said he was engaged in a war of nerves which would soon be over.
So much of this sounds eerily reminiscent of recent history. The only difference I can see between then and now is that with Iraq there were no Johnsons or Eshkols to make a serious effort to hold back war. (The best we had was weak little Colin Powell.)
As for the results of these wars, was there really a difference? The whole world now lives with the unpleasant consequences of both of them.
NO ADMISSION COMING
All the good things Obama has done or may do balance out negatively against his being in Wall Street's pocket. And some day someone is going to figure this out.
I didn't want Hillary because I believed the Clinton's were in Wall Street's pocket. I noted at the time that nobody really knew how much of Obama was in the pocket, too. I figured Edwards, being a trial lawyer, was a safer bet on that score. But who knows, maybe that pocket was big enough to hold all of them.
Maybe I would feel better about Obama if he just showed a bit of that transparency he's always talking about and rarely demonstrating. Maybe he should just come right out and tell us that he fucked us so the banks could get richer. Maybe that would tilt the balance sheet a little.
But Obama's banking dealings are like Cheney's energy policy. The only difference is that Cheney wanted to keep secret who he was helping out. Obama doesn't care if everyone knows where he's coming from, but, like Cheney, he is never going to admit it.
I will always hate Obama for this. Even if he gets the Messiah to come.
I didn't want Hillary because I believed the Clinton's were in Wall Street's pocket. I noted at the time that nobody really knew how much of Obama was in the pocket, too. I figured Edwards, being a trial lawyer, was a safer bet on that score. But who knows, maybe that pocket was big enough to hold all of them.
Maybe I would feel better about Obama if he just showed a bit of that transparency he's always talking about and rarely demonstrating. Maybe he should just come right out and tell us that he fucked us so the banks could get richer. Maybe that would tilt the balance sheet a little.
But Obama's banking dealings are like Cheney's energy policy. The only difference is that Cheney wanted to keep secret who he was helping out. Obama doesn't care if everyone knows where he's coming from, but, like Cheney, he is never going to admit it.
I will always hate Obama for this. Even if he gets the Messiah to come.
Arianna Huffington: Shattering the Right vs. Left Prism Once Again: The Wall Street Journal Goes After Goldman and the Bank Bailout
Ultra-Orthodox Protest In Israel Over Arrest Of Woman Suspected Of Starving Son
Ultra-Orthodox Protest In Israel Over Arrest Of Woman Suspected Of Starving Son
There was a time when I would have said this is why I don't want to go to Israel. But now that Christians are doing the same sorts of things here, it doesn't seem to matter where you are.
That's why Shaya went back to Israel.
There was a time when I would have said this is why I don't want to go to Israel. But now that Christians are doing the same sorts of things here, it doesn't seem to matter where you are.
That's why Shaya went back to Israel.
Redneck Games Slideshow: Vote
Redneck Games Slideshow: Vote
Why is it the only people who still want to relive Woodstock are people who would have shot hippies in 1969?
Why is it the only people who still want to relive Woodstock are people who would have shot hippies in 1969?
Catherine Crabill, VA GOP Candidate: We May Have To "Resort To The Bullet Box" (VIDEO)
Catherine Crabill, VA GOP Candidate: We May Have To "Resort To The Bullet Box" (VIDEO)
Time was when people like this were confined to picnic tables at shooting ranges. Who let them out in public?
The media.
Time was when people like this were confined to picnic tables at shooting ranges. Who let them out in public?
The media.
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
USING IT
The critical point about the involvement of The Family in the Ensign and Sanford affairs has been entirely missed by the press:
Anyone who believes God has put him in power may believe in democracy as an abstract principle but does not believe it applies to him. It was not the voters who put him in, it was the Deity - i.e., as to himself, he is a Royalist.
Anyone with that belief should be automatically disqualified from holding office in any democracy. He doesn't believe in the system; he's just using it.
Anyone who believes God has put him in power may believe in democracy as an abstract principle but does not believe it applies to him. It was not the voters who put him in, it was the Deity - i.e., as to himself, he is a Royalist.
Anyone with that belief should be automatically disqualified from holding office in any democracy. He doesn't believe in the system; he's just using it.
WHO BENEFITS?
Goldman Sachs salaries do not bother me. They make the money - who better to spend it on than the people who generate it?
What may bother me - and I say "may" because I really don't understand GS's brand of high finance - is: what are people paying them all this money for? How does GS make all this money? Is it from trading their own assets and cash? If so, from where did they get the money to buy these assets? If they're dealing with other people's money, what are these people getting that's worth the cost? Why is their position in this economy unique - or is it?
I need a good explanation of all this, and I'd take it from any source.
I have just discovered the website GoldmanSachs666.com. Maybe I'll find my answers there.
What may bother me - and I say "may" because I really don't understand GS's brand of high finance - is: what are people paying them all this money for? How does GS make all this money? Is it from trading their own assets and cash? If so, from where did they get the money to buy these assets? If they're dealing with other people's money, what are these people getting that's worth the cost? Why is their position in this economy unique - or is it?
I need a good explanation of all this, and I'd take it from any source.
I have just discovered the website GoldmanSachs666.com. Maybe I'll find my answers there.
HISTORY
Re the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and many others:
You must understand history to understand where you are. But history should not dictate where you go from here.
You must understand history to understand where you are. But history should not dictate where you go from here.
WHY ARE JEWS ANGRY WITH MADOFF?
Well, the ones who got stolen from, that's obvious. Others are angry because Madoff stole from Jews. Even the most conservative Kabbalists, who believe is perfectly okay to defraud non-Jews (a position remarkably similar to certain parts of the Qur'an) think it's abominable to screw Jews - at least en masse.
Others are upset because Madoff tends to confirm the worst claims of Jew haters. Never mind that plenty of non-Jews are just as bad or worse. Jews have long felt that for their survival (and also because their religion calls for it specifically) Jews must be more faultless than others - meaning they must live up up a higher standard - at least until Israel began complaining that it was being held to a higher standard than Arabs, ignoring the fact that that obligation was set by Jews and recognized the Jewish claim of a higher morality. That Israeli position amounts to saying that Jews are like everyone else - a statement which would be immediately refuted by hundreds of generations of Jews, from rabbis on down. And which is inconsistent with Jewish claims of specialness due to the Holocaust, unless special means only what we're entitled to and not also our obligations arising from specialness which is conferred by culture, DNA, the Torah and victimhood.
But how about those Jews who DON'T hate Madoff? What kind of people are they?
Monday, July 13, 2009
Whitehouse: Roberts Court Already Activist
Whitehouse: Roberts Court Already Activist
Back when I was president of the Rhode Island Trial Lawyers Association, Sheldon Whitehouse made a big push for no fault insurance - which caused me to type him as a business conservative. Now, though, judging from many statements I've heard him make, I believe Whitehouse may be a very effective liberal. He has certainly eclipsed Jack Reed, and I think he may be heading for a presidential run in 2016, if the party is then center left.
Back when I was president of the Rhode Island Trial Lawyers Association, Sheldon Whitehouse made a big push for no fault insurance - which caused me to type him as a business conservative. Now, though, judging from many statements I've heard him make, I believe Whitehouse may be a very effective liberal. He has certainly eclipsed Jack Reed, and I think he may be heading for a presidential run in 2016, if the party is then center left.
Obama Calms Jewish Leaders: Press Has Built Up Conflict
Obama Calms Jewish Leaders: Press Has Built Up Conflict
This is very interesting. The article does not identify most of the participants, although I know from an email that J Street was there. But it sounds as if these participants were not objecting to pressure on Israel but had the perception that there was not equal pressure on the Palestinians. That, if true, is a great leap forward, because up to now some of the Jewish groups have refused to accept any pressure on Israel at all. On the other hand, maybe the ADL and AIPAC were not there.
This is very interesting. The article does not identify most of the participants, although I know from an email that J Street was there. But it sounds as if these participants were not objecting to pressure on Israel but had the perception that there was not equal pressure on the Palestinians. That, if true, is a great leap forward, because up to now some of the Jewish groups have refused to accept any pressure on Israel at all. On the other hand, maybe the ADL and AIPAC were not there.
Gail Lowe: Perry Picks Creationist To Run State Education Board
Gail Lowe: Perry Picks Creationist To Run State Education Board
Wow, what great choices you get when you live in Texas!
Wow, what great choices you get when you live in Texas!
Netanyahu Invites Abbas To Talk Peace
Netanyahu Invites Abbas To Talk Peace
This is Palestinian stupidity. Any refusal to meet by either side is insane. Abbas should meet with Netanyahu and make his position very clear - but both sides need to listen. By refusing to meet, Abbas takes the blame for failure on himself.
I think he's only heard half of Obama's message - that the settlements are unacceptable. He apparently has not heard the other half - where Obama said he would meet with anyone with no preconditions.
This is Palestinian stupidity. Any refusal to meet by either side is insane. Abbas should meet with Netanyahu and make his position very clear - but both sides need to listen. By refusing to meet, Abbas takes the blame for failure on himself.
I think he's only heard half of Obama's message - that the settlements are unacceptable. He apparently has not heard the other half - where Obama said he would meet with anyone with no preconditions.
Sunday, July 12, 2009
Deseret News | Kissers protest near Temple Square
Deseret News | Kissers protest near Temple Square
Not a lot of people, but precisely the idea - get in the streets and demonstrate.
Not a lot of people, but precisely the idea - get in the streets and demonstrate.
SAND
The New York Times is reporting today that after three local political leaders in Baluchistan were murdered (Baluchistanis suspect Pakistani intelligence agencies)an insurgency is breaking out in that territory, which makes up a third of Pakistan. Musharraf routinely rounded up Baluchi dissidents and tortured them. They say the practice is continuing. There have been riots, strikes and civil disobedience. Normally secluded women have joined street protests.
This is not the Taliban, or even Islamic - although Quetta, one of the Taliban's main Pakistani redoubts, is in Baluchistan. The insurgency, which has been going on for some years, is turning into a national liberation movement. (Baluchistan was annexed by Pakistan when Pakistan was created in 1947.)
Not a word about this has appeared in other national media. Even the Huffington Post has ignored it. Why? If our primary concern these days is the stability of Pakistan, it would be good to know and factor in the fact that 1/3 of the country is close to a state of rebellion.
But Pakistan - or at least its government - is regarded here as a good guy. (That this view is delusional is another story.) So while our media like to report on an insurgency there which is directed by our enemies, they won't report a national liberation movement which has no ties (so far as I know) to Islamic fundamentalism - one which has grown because of government repression for strictly internal reasons.
China and Iran are bad guys, so the media reports on liberation movements in those countries, because those movements are viewed as a good thing. We need Pakistan to suppress the Baluchis because we need Pakistan to remain intact. The prospect of the country dissolving under the pressure of two simultaneous insurgencies is more than we can bear to think about.
You get to like sand when you stick your head in it.
This is not the Taliban, or even Islamic - although Quetta, one of the Taliban's main Pakistani redoubts, is in Baluchistan. The insurgency, which has been going on for some years, is turning into a national liberation movement. (Baluchistan was annexed by Pakistan when Pakistan was created in 1947.)
Not a word about this has appeared in other national media. Even the Huffington Post has ignored it. Why? If our primary concern these days is the stability of Pakistan, it would be good to know and factor in the fact that 1/3 of the country is close to a state of rebellion.
But Pakistan - or at least its government - is regarded here as a good guy. (That this view is delusional is another story.) So while our media like to report on an insurgency there which is directed by our enemies, they won't report a national liberation movement which has no ties (so far as I know) to Islamic fundamentalism - one which has grown because of government repression for strictly internal reasons.
China and Iran are bad guys, so the media reports on liberation movements in those countries, because those movements are viewed as a good thing. We need Pakistan to suppress the Baluchis because we need Pakistan to remain intact. The prospect of the country dissolving under the pressure of two simultaneous insurgencies is more than we can bear to think about.
You get to like sand when you stick your head in it.
PRONUNCIATION CHECK?
I'm listening to an audio of a best selling book from a major publisher. The book is full of Hebrew words and the reader has mispronounced half of them. Why would a big house let something like that through? Well - why spend the money to hire an observant Jew to "edit"?
Sloppy and I should think embarrassing. Like, for example, how I probably misspelled that last word.
Sloppy and I should think embarrassing. Like, for example, how I probably misspelled that last word.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
NOT US
Naomi Wolf writes:
Street protest, if it can sustain itself for more than that crucial first week, has an effect that is both tactical and emotional; mass protest during the French Revolution made it clear to the courtiers that this rebellion would be too profound to quell in the usual manner; street protests in the American colonies, in the face of arrest or worse, made the colonies ungovernable even before George III waged a costly, unpopular war. In Estonia in the 1980s, the small, illegal protests that surrounded the public singing of the banned national anthem grew, and Estonians were emboldened as their numbers swelled by the thousands daily.
In the United States, street protests helped bring the Vietnam war to an end, and the mass protests of the civil rights movement showed that, as Martin Luther King, Jr. put it, "business as usual" could no longer continue. According to King, disruptive mass protest exposes the tension that has been hidden or ignored, so that it can be addressed. (Ironically, such protest is now largely illegal in the US because of a systematic effort to deter it through a thirty year process of over-permiticization).
Iran's citizens -- and all people longing to resist a tyrannical government or to protest in an established democracy -- should bear the lessons of history in mind. Protest that works must disrupt business as usual and, ideally, stop traffic. Iranian citizens have shown great courage, and they would do well to continue pouring into the street and sitting down, lying down, or standing still. Unless a regime is willing to start machine-gunning its citizens, peaceful, steady, long-term disruption of "business as usual" always works.
______________________________________________
It would have worked against Bush, too, if anyone had been interested in doing it. I sincerely doubt that, on further occasions when civil liberties are threatened, Americans have the will to get into the streets. Unless they are the folks with the strange view of civil liberties who believe that any government action is anathema. Even they haven't been in the streets much (although they've shot a few people). But they will get out there when they feel they need to. I don't think we will.
Street protest, if it can sustain itself for more than that crucial first week, has an effect that is both tactical and emotional; mass protest during the French Revolution made it clear to the courtiers that this rebellion would be too profound to quell in the usual manner; street protests in the American colonies, in the face of arrest or worse, made the colonies ungovernable even before George III waged a costly, unpopular war. In Estonia in the 1980s, the small, illegal protests that surrounded the public singing of the banned national anthem grew, and Estonians were emboldened as their numbers swelled by the thousands daily.
In the United States, street protests helped bring the Vietnam war to an end, and the mass protests of the civil rights movement showed that, as Martin Luther King, Jr. put it, "business as usual" could no longer continue. According to King, disruptive mass protest exposes the tension that has been hidden or ignored, so that it can be addressed. (Ironically, such protest is now largely illegal in the US because of a systematic effort to deter it through a thirty year process of over-permiticization).
Iran's citizens -- and all people longing to resist a tyrannical government or to protest in an established democracy -- should bear the lessons of history in mind. Protest that works must disrupt business as usual and, ideally, stop traffic. Iranian citizens have shown great courage, and they would do well to continue pouring into the street and sitting down, lying down, or standing still. Unless a regime is willing to start machine-gunning its citizens, peaceful, steady, long-term disruption of "business as usual" always works.
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It would have worked against Bush, too, if anyone had been interested in doing it. I sincerely doubt that, on further occasions when civil liberties are threatened, Americans have the will to get into the streets. Unless they are the folks with the strange view of civil liberties who believe that any government action is anathema. Even they haven't been in the streets much (although they've shot a few people). But they will get out there when they feel they need to. I don't think we will.
BALLS
"Iran summons the Italian Ambassador to Tehran Alberto Bradanini in protest against the violent suppression of anti-G8 protesters. Bradanini was summoned to the Iranian Foreign Ministry on Friday to hear Tehran's concerns about the 'violent suppression of justice-seeking protesters by the Italian police.'"
You gotta respect the sheer balls of this. Unless it's unintentional delusional thinking.
You gotta respect the sheer balls of this. Unless it's unintentional delusional thinking.
ARTLESS IN TEHRAN
The head of Tehran's police says few arrests were made in opposition protests that erupted in the Iranian capital in an opposition attempt to revive street demonstrations over the country's disputed election.
Police chief Azizullah Rajabzadeh says those arrested in Thursday's protests were involved in "damaging public property and chanting," according to a report Friday in the semi-official Mehr news agency.
Okay, so they'll bust you for singing - but will they bust you for hiphop moves?
Police chief Azizullah Rajabzadeh says those arrested in Thursday's protests were involved in "damaging public property and chanting," according to a report Friday in the semi-official Mehr news agency.
Okay, so they'll bust you for singing - but will they bust you for hiphop moves?
Friday, July 10, 2009
It's Not Just a Recession. It's a Mancession! - The Atlantic Business Channel
It's Not Just a Recession. It's a Mancession! - The Atlantic Business Channel
The end result of this, as I have said many times, will be a permanently unemployable and angry male working class. Give it a couple of years and some new Lenin is going to start making a lot of sense to these guys.
What is it that women do that men can't? Other than modeling push-up bras, not very much. What is that women do that men don't? As the article says, work as secretaries and administrative assistants, registered nurses, school teachers, cashiers, retail salespersons and health aides.
There is no reason that men couldn't do these jobs. I worked as a secretary once upon a time. There are a fair number of male nurses, teachers and cashiers and most retail jobs were at one time held by males.
But these are the careers women have gone into during all the long years they were barred from anything else. Jews were barred from anything but banking until fairly recently. So it's no wonder that so many bankers are Jews, and it's no wonder that so many of these listed jobs are held by women.
I have no doubt that, as the article says, the pay disparity between women and men is now working against men. But these listed jobs are all in the service sector - even though health care keeps trying to prove it is not a service business. The jobs that men are losing now are often jobs that created products and, in some cases, ideas. So it shouldn't be comforting even to women that the only place they can get a job is in businesses which produce nothing and simply serve to circulate the same dollar around a community.
And that is a very big problem, and requires thirty pages of Wikipedia.
The end result of this, as I have said many times, will be a permanently unemployable and angry male working class. Give it a couple of years and some new Lenin is going to start making a lot of sense to these guys.
What is it that women do that men can't? Other than modeling push-up bras, not very much. What is that women do that men don't? As the article says, work as secretaries and administrative assistants, registered nurses, school teachers, cashiers, retail salespersons and health aides.
There is no reason that men couldn't do these jobs. I worked as a secretary once upon a time. There are a fair number of male nurses, teachers and cashiers and most retail jobs were at one time held by males.
But these are the careers women have gone into during all the long years they were barred from anything else. Jews were barred from anything but banking until fairly recently. So it's no wonder that so many bankers are Jews, and it's no wonder that so many of these listed jobs are held by women.
I have no doubt that, as the article says, the pay disparity between women and men is now working against men. But these listed jobs are all in the service sector - even though health care keeps trying to prove it is not a service business. The jobs that men are losing now are often jobs that created products and, in some cases, ideas. So it shouldn't be comforting even to women that the only place they can get a job is in businesses which produce nothing and simply serve to circulate the same dollar around a community.
And that is a very big problem, and requires thirty pages of Wikipedia.
Administration Considers Bailout Funds for Small Businesses - washingtonpost.com
Administration Considers Bailout Funds for Small Businesses - washingtonpost.com
Finally, a decent economic idea - and Geithner and Summers haven't decided whether to support it? Well, why should they? Look where the money would come from.
Finally, a decent economic idea - and Geithner and Summers haven't decided whether to support it? Well, why should they? Look where the money would come from.
David Brooks: A Republican Senator 'Had His Hand On My Inner Thigh' For A 'Whole' Dinner Party (VIDEO)
David Brooks: A Republican Senator 'Had His Hand On My Inner Thigh' For A 'Whole' Dinner Party (VIDEO)
Here's what Brooks was missing: if Brooks was gay, he might very well have welcomed that hand on his thigh. The maneuver is not out of bounds in much of the gay community. And David Brooks does seem a little gay... so I will bet Senator Whoever assumed he was.
Here's what Brooks was missing: if Brooks was gay, he might very well have welcomed that hand on his thigh. The maneuver is not out of bounds in much of the gay community. And David Brooks does seem a little gay... so I will bet Senator Whoever assumed he was.
TheHill.com - House overwhelmingly rejects signing statement
TheHill.com - House overwhelmingly rejects signing statement
Bloody good. More more more rejection of Obama Bushisms.
Bloody good. More more more rejection of Obama Bushisms.
Thursday, July 09, 2009
Ensign Paid Mistress' Family $96,000
Ensign Paid Mistress' Family $96,000
So Senator Ensign didn't pay off his mistress. His daddy and mommy did. And he lives in a dormitory with other Christian boys.
I thought you had to be an adult to be a United States Senator.
So Senator Ensign didn't pay off his mistress. His daddy and mommy did. And he lives in a dormitory with other Christian boys.
I thought you had to be an adult to be a United States Senator.
DeMint: America is ‘Where Germany Was Before World War II’ | The Washington Independent
DeMint: America is ‘Where Germany Was Before World War II’ | The Washington Independent
When before World War II? Weimar? The Third Reich? Either Demint believes that Weimar socialism led directly to the Third Reich (it did, but only in the sense that the Third Reich was its enemy) - or that socialism and Nazism are the same. Understandable that some people might be confused - Hitler did call his party National Socialist - but do we need people in Congress who don't know the difference? This guy should be out on the golf course trying to screw his friends.
When before World War II? Weimar? The Third Reich? Either Demint believes that Weimar socialism led directly to the Third Reich (it did, but only in the sense that the Third Reich was its enemy) - or that socialism and Nazism are the same. Understandable that some people might be confused - Hitler did call his party National Socialist - but do we need people in Congress who don't know the difference? This guy should be out on the golf course trying to screw his friends.
Frank Ricci: GOP To Showcase Firefighter Sotomayor Ruled Against
Frank Ricci: GOP To Showcase Firefighter Sotomayor Ruled Against
As politics devolves into the Theatre of the Absurd, will real life follow?
Probably.
As politics devolves into the Theatre of the Absurd, will real life follow?
Probably.
AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth: AIDS activists shut down US Capitol rotunda over Obama reversal on AIDS policy
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
House Finance Committee Members Took $62.9 Million From Industry Interests
House Finance Committee Members Took $62.9 Million From Industry Interests
I certainly have no objection to the health care industry talking to congresspeople and trying to get their vote - but this is a simple attempt to bribe, and probably a successful one.
Shouldn't there be a rule that congresspeople cannot accept contributions from anyone who has a particular interest in legislation they are considering?
Of course, I already have figured out the loophole. They don't make the contributions while the bill is pending. They make them way beforehand, because they know some bill is going to come before these people. In other words, they don't buy action on the bill. They buy the congresspeople.
Which returns me to my initial response to McCain-Feingold. You can't outlaw money in politics. There's a way around any restriction. What you have to do is change what the public will accept, and guarantee that players get voted out.
I certainly have no objection to the health care industry talking to congresspeople and trying to get their vote - but this is a simple attempt to bribe, and probably a successful one.
Shouldn't there be a rule that congresspeople cannot accept contributions from anyone who has a particular interest in legislation they are considering?
Of course, I already have figured out the loophole. They don't make the contributions while the bill is pending. They make them way beforehand, because they know some bill is going to come before these people. In other words, they don't buy action on the bill. They buy the congresspeople.
Which returns me to my initial response to McCain-Feingold. You can't outlaw money in politics. There's a way around any restriction. What you have to do is change what the public will accept, and guarantee that players get voted out.
A BETTER EXPLANATION
After finishing Descent into Chaos, I have to say that it would not be too much of a stretch to conclude that US policy in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, from Ronald Reagan to now, has been designed to destroy the peace and power of America and even to promote one or more attacks on the US mainland. Because for anyone who actually believes in America, that's a better explanation than blindness, stupidity and cupidity.
Tuesday, July 07, 2009
JACKSON FOR PRESIDENT
A new poll indicates that 71% of Republicans would vote for Sarah Palin for President. Since Republicans have apparently forgotten that the president actually has to run the country, I suggest they nominate Michael Jackson in 2012. I bet he'd do better than 71%. And I don't think there's anything in the Constitution which requires a candidate to be alive.
This much I can say: if she is the Republican nominee in 2012, I will be preparing to flee the USA. I know we just lived through eight years of an ignorant president - which proves I don't bail out hastily - but Palin is Bush cubed. Today she announced that there is a Department of Law in the White House which would throw out ethics complaints against her when she's in office. This seems Constitutionally unlikely - face it, there's no such thing - but hey, we won't need a Constitution if she gets in.
This much I can say: if she is the Republican nominee in 2012, I will be preparing to flee the USA. I know we just lived through eight years of an ignorant president - which proves I don't bail out hastily - but Palin is Bush cubed. Today she announced that there is a Department of Law in the White House which would throw out ethics complaints against her when she's in office. This seems Constitutionally unlikely - face it, there's no such thing - but hey, we won't need a Constitution if she gets in.
Anti-Abortion Activists Push New, Radical Egg-As-Person Measures
Anti-Abortion Activists Push New, Radical Egg-As-Person Measures
They will go further and further off the cliff. I hope we don't follow them.
They will go further and further off the cliff. I hope we don't follow them.