Things You Don't Talk About in Polite Company

Phoenix Rising?

2009-03-31T21:19:00.001-05:00

Tentative plans are to resurrect this blog sometime in late April. Stay tuned.

Preseving in Brutalism

2008-08-08T02:49:00.000-05:00

In Washington, D.C., a Christian Science church wants to tear down its existing building which is expensive to maintain, but are stymied by the building being declared a historic landmark because of its Modernist style known as brutalism.

Nobody Likes The Happening

2008-06-15T22:46:00.000-05:00

Nobody likes The Happening.

Over at The New Republic, James Kirchick says, "
This isn't just radical environemntalist fare; it's perverse and anti-human." Meanwhile, Jesse Taylor at Pandagon calls it an "anti-science Intelligent Design film."

Booman on Southern Populism

2008-06-13T08:24:00.000-05:00

See here.

I've suggested that the Democratic Party should be a progressive-populist alliance. Populists in the mold that Booman describes are not just southern, but also found in the Midwest and Mountain regions. They are better coalition partners for progressives than Blue Dogs or DLCers, I think.

We Are (The) Family

2008-06-05T02:11:00.000-05:00

Here's a thread at Open Left featuringJeff Sharlet, author of a book about the Family, also known as the Fellowship, a secretive Christian group with several influential members.

Pfleger suspended

2008-06-03T16:43:00.000-05:00

Via Political Punch:

Francis Cardinal George, the Archbishop of Chicago, just issued the following statement about controversial Obama friend Father Michael Pfleger:

"To put recent events in some perspective, I have asked Father Michael Pfleger, Pastor of St. Sabina’s Parish, to step back from his obligations there and take leave for a couple of weeks from his pastoral duties, effective today. Fr. Pfleger does not believe this to be the right step at this time. While respecting his disagreement, I have nevertheless asked him to use this opportunity to reflect on his recent statements and actions in the light of the Church’s regulations for all Catholic priests. I hope that this period will also be a time away from the public spotlight and for rest and attention to family concerns.

"I hope also that the life of St. Sabina’s parish may continue in uninterrupted fashion. Fr. William Vanecko, Pastor of St. Kilian’s parish, will be temporary administrator of St. Sabina’s and will assure the full complement of ministerial services during this period. I ask the members of St. Sabina’s parish to cooperate with him and to keep him and Fr. Pfleger in their prayers. They are in mine."

Moinorail

2008-06-02T19:47:00.000-05:00

matthew Yglesias notes a dispute between a Republican who wants to build a monorail and a Democrat who doesn't. I would have set the over/under for first response referencing The Simpsons at 4.5. The first response to do so is #3. I don't know if I have a career as a bookmaker.

Iraqis say Marine promoted Christianity - Conflict in Iraq- msnbc.com

2008-05-30T19:47:00.000-05:00

Iraqis say Marine promoted Christianity - Conflict in Iraq- msnbc.com: "A U.S. Marine handed out coins promoting Christianity to Muslims in the former insurgent stronghold of Fallujah, outraged Sunni officials said Friday. The U.S. military responded quickly, removing a trooper from duty pending an investigation."

Maybe they should punish him by not removing him from duty and seeing what happens.

Factoring Scott McClellan

2008-05-30T19:24:00.000-05:00

Jossip reports that Bill O'Reilly will finally get to talk to disgruntled Bush administration mouthpiece Scott McClellan. This after complaining that McClellan backed out of an agreement to appear, only to have someone from McClellan's publisher note:

I work for McClellan’s publisher and saw first-hand what happened: We booked Scott’s media on the highest-rated shows that called us first. Whatever Scott may have said to him in the past, show producers know that these gigs are booked through book publicists. But we did not get a call from O’Reilly. When we reached out to them, because Scott did very much want to appear on Fox’s best-rated show, O’Reilly’s producer would not agree to have Scott come on unless they could “go first.” Since we already had long committed to other shows who demonstrated early interest, we could not just put O’Reilly at the front of the queue and renege on those existing commitments. Whereupon O’Reilly’s producer declined to have him on at all. We are happy to sell books to anyone, and have booked many an author on O’Reilly; but we are not happy to acquiesce to the “me first or I don’t play at all” tactics of show producers, nor do we like them then trying to pass off the absence of the guest as some kind of evil money-making ploy on our part and moral superiority on theirs. So it’s not ok for a publishing house to try to make money, but ok for a television show to try to get ratings (which lead to advertisers which lead to money)?

Science Has Good and Bad Consequences

2008-05-29T00:03:00.000-05:00

Over at Firedoglake, Dr. Kirk Murphy writes: "Last week, we learned the latest new 'hot' technology -- carbon nanotubes -- could be every bit as deadly as asbestos (a former 'hot' technology). A few days before that, we learned cell phone use during pregnancy makes the fetus far more likely to grow up to have behavioral problems. Ho-hum. Yet more chapters in our American lives -- and deaths -- without the precautionary principle."

Here's a warning for technophiles who think that science will solve all problems. It used to be that people thought that genetically modified organisms would serve world hunger. They haven't and, in fact, some people are now afraid of them. I predict a similar trend for some of the newest science miracle methods out there. It could be stem cell research or it could be something else. Maybe we will discover that wireless internet use causes behavioral problems, too. I don't know what it will be, but it seems wrong to fail to consider the possible worst-case scenarios. Concentrating on only the good consequences that you think might happens leads you into mistakes like a stupid war in Iraq.

Hendrik Hertzberg: Online Only: The New Yorker

2008-05-28T11:24:00.000-05:00

From Hendrik Hertzberg in The New Yorker:

Theory two: it had something to do with the difference between Irish Catholic and Southern Baptist views of sin and forgiveness. As many people noticed at the time, the Lewinsky brouhaha drove not just Chris but also Michael Kelly, Tim Russert, and Maureen Dowd completely round the bend. For the Catholics, sins are to be confessed in the privacy of a closed booth to a priest who is the bottom rung on a ladder of long-established authority that runs upward through the hierarchy, the Pope, the saints, and only then to the Supreme Judge of the Universe. Forgiveness is administered via prescribed rituals sanctified by centuries of uninterrupted use. For low-church Protestants like Clinton (and Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker), confession usually comes after you get caught, is noisily public, and is so bound up with high-profile damage control that its sincerity cannot be assumed. Forgiveness comes from a chaotic combination of constituency politics (be the constituency a congregation or a party) and one’s “personal relationship” with Jesus, a notion Catholics find as creepy as Protestants find Marianism. The sloppy, sappy, self-indulgent theological and personal indiscipline of it all—that’s what R.C.s can’t stand. Anyway, that’s my theory, offered with this caveat: I’m not sure I know what I’m talking about.

I've also heard suggestions that Catholic Democrats don't like Democratic politicians who come across as Protestant preachers. I'm not sure how much I buy into this theory, but it is something to think about.

Eric Alterman on Libertarianism

2008-05-22T09:05:00.000-05:00

I agree with what Eric Alterman has to say.

I share the libertarian concern with the growth of bureaucracy and as Brink was kind enough to mention, also locate the core of liberal thought in the experiences and insights of the Enlightenment--and focus on their implications for the rights of the individual. But as John Dewey argued, "liberty" should be imagined not as an abstract principle merely to be admired but as "the effective power to do specific things"--things that could not be done by people enjoying only the theoretical ability to act on their freedoms. No longer could the slogan of political liberals be "Let the government keep its hands off industry and commerce," as the government became necessary to protect the individual's freedom from the growing power of just those forces. "There is no such thing as the liberty or effective power of an individual, group, or class," Dewey explained, "except in relation to the liberties, the effective powers, of other individuals, groups or classes."

I feel that libertarianism, as I understand it, is overly concerned with theoretical liberty at the expense of its actual practice. The freedom to starve, to see one's labor unfairly exploited, to drink polluted water or breath polluted air, are not freedoms I strongly value. And to battle these and others like them, society requires collective institutional action and in many cases, government (or labor union) protection. I'm no fan of "big government" per se--and neither was Dewey. It's merely that powerful forces like global corporations require powerful forces to balance them.

My version of liberalism tends to be a pragmatic choice which understands that an idealized world is not possible and which accepts the necessity of trade-offs.

The Dalai Lama in Seattle

2008-04-11T14:28:00.000-05:00

Via the International Herald Tribune:

Here's one tidbit I find interesting:

People have long moved to Seattle "to separate, to differentiate themselves from their families and their traditions," said James Wellman Jr., an associate professor in the comparative religion department at the University of Washington. "And then they get here, and there's not many people, so there's this sense of isolation. There's an ambivalence about it. They both love it and they wonder, 'Well, how can I connect?' "

Spirituality and self-help sections in bookstores do well, neighborhood farmers' markets thrive, and craigslist is the place to go this week if you want to buy tickets from scalpers to see the "simple monk" from Tibet.

Wellman said it was striking that little had been made of the fact that the Dalai Lama was speaking at a public university, where he is also to receive an honorary doctorate, and that his visit was being openly supported by many local elected officials. Should Pope Benedict XVI extend his United States visit to Seattle, he said, "that would cause so much tension: people would fear church-and-state problems."

Tibetan Buddhism "gets a pass," he said, in part because many people here say it is not so much a religion as "a spiritual way of being in the world that's about nonviolence and peace.

Buddhism as practiced by some Americans is reminiscent of "New Age" religion. I think of them as Rorschach religions because they seem to have belief systems interpreted to confirm what the "believer" already feels is true.

Paris Is Well Worth a Mass: Muslim Edition

2008-04-08T11:17:00.000-05:00

From the Times Online via Bookninja:

SIR SALMAN RUSHDIE has confessed that he pretended to “embrace Islam” in the hope that it would reduce the threat of Muslims acting on the fatwa to kill him.

The author issued a statement in 1990 in order to defuse the row about his novel The Satanic Verses, which had provoked Muslims across the world. He claimed he had renewed his Muslim faith, had repudiated the attacks on Islam in his novel and was committed to working for better understanding of the religion across the world.

However, in an interview to be broadcast next month, Rushdie now claims his reversion to the religion of his birth was all a “pretence”.

Seriously, did anyone think that Rushdie was sincere?

Obama Still Not a Muslim

2008-03-14T01:36:00.000-05:00

MSNBC.com's First Read notes about the most recent NBC/WSJ poll:

The percentage of respondents who correctly identified Obama as a Christian increased from 18% to 37%. But those identifying him as a Muslim also increased five points (from 8% to 13%). Fifty-eight percent said globalization has been bad for the country; just 25% said it has been good. Congress’ approval rating is at 19%. And just 14% view Nader in a positive light; 37% have a negative impression of him. The poll was conducted March 7-10 among 1,012 registered voters, and it has a 3.1% margin of error.

Keith Olbermann Breaks the Internet

2008-03-12T21:46:00.000-05:00

Or at least Daily Kos. His announcement of a special comment on Clinton and Ferraro got over 1000 comments and forced them to disable comments and ask someone to start up a new diary for discussion.

On the Jesuits

2008-03-12T19:52:00.000-05:00

Steven R. McEvoy has an essay up on "Why The Jesuits?"

My favorite part is his assessment of Malachi Martin:

When I started the research for this paper, I intended to compare and contrast the Jesuits through the eyes of Douglas Letson, and Michael W. Higgins and their book The Jesuit Mystique, and Malachi Martin's book, The Jesuits: The Society of Jesus and the Betrayal of the Roman Catholic Church. But in talking with Michael Higgins and in starting to read the latter, I agree with Michaels assessment of Martin, namely: "He's Nuts". He is an ex-Jesuit who is bitter and filled with anger.

Eliot Spitzer and Double Standards

2008-03-12T18:48:00.000-05:00

Over at Open Left, Chris Bowers wonders if Eliot Spitzer's resignation is part of a partisan double standard, which turns into a bash the media session.

I ask in the comments:

What about Barney Frank? He weathered a scandal involving a male prostitute.

Really, it's very simple. If you have a high approval rating, you can survive a sex scandal. Spitzer has poor approval ratings. So did McGreevey. Vitter had a strong approval rating of his constituents. Bill Clinton and Barney Frank likewise.

If Spitzer was the most popular governor in the country, I bet he wouldn't resign. If the Monica Lewinsky thing had happened in 1994, Bill Clinton might have.

Commenter texas dem backs me up by saying that Senate Democrats would have turned on Clinton in 1998 if his poll numbers hadn't held up.

Over at the Mojo blog, Johnathan Stein asks about Spitzer vs. Larry Craig and David Vitter:

So what's the double standard? Governors vs. Senators? Jews vs. Gentiles? Democrats vs. Republicans? Or people with self-respect vs. people without?

Catholic-Muslim Summit

2008-03-06T06:01:00.000-06:00

Coming to a Vatican near you in November.

Does the Vatican Have Obamamania?

2008-02-26T20:01:00.000-06:00

Well, OK, probably not. But a column in the Vatican's official newspaper criticized Hollywood for rewarding films such as There Will Be Blood and No Country For Old Men for their "hopelessness." Gaetano Vallini was critical of the "lack of moral conscience" and the "obliterat[ion] of the American dream," preferring more positive films such as The Diving Bell and the Butterfly and Juno.

I haven't seen any of these films, but I share the general sentiment that there is too much of a "grim and gritty" focus in popular culture at times. What are some good recent movies with hopeful, optimistic outlooks that can serve as an antidote to the Bush years?

Death Leave

2008-02-26T17:25:00.000-06:00

Pope Benedict is calling for people caring for terminally ill family members to have "death leave" analogous to parents having maternity leave.

Obama As Psychotherapist to a Nation?

2008-02-26T09:09:00.000-06:00

Lisa Schiffren at The Corner links to this column by Spengler in the Asia Times that analyzes Obama by the women in his life. It's an interesting analysis, even if I don't agree. Here's one tidbit:

Obama profiles Americans the way anthropologists interact with primitive peoples. He holds his own view in reserve and emphatically draws out the feelings of others; that is how friends and colleagues describe his modus operandi since his days at the Harvard Law Review, through his years as a community activist in Chicago, and in national politics. Anthropologists, though, proceed from resentment against the devouring culture of America and sympathy with the endangered cultures of the primitive world. Obama inverts the anthropological model: he applies the tools of cultural manipulation out of resentment against America. The probable next president of the United States is a mother's revenge against the America she despised.

I don't think that Obama is resentful of America, but I wouldn't be surprised if he uses the technique described of keeping his true thoughts close to the vest in order to find out what other people think. It sounds a bit like client-centered therapy, that unstructured form of psychotherapy pioneered by Carl Rogers which involves the therapist acting as a sort of a mirror that clarifies how the client feels.

An Apt Comparison?

2008-02-25T21:32:00.000-06:00

At MyDD, Glenn Smith argues that Hillary Clinton's campaign is reminiscent of Jim Mattox/ Who is Jim Mattox? A Democrat with a solid record as Texas attorney general who was running for governor. And if you don't remember him, that's because he was beaten in the primary by Ann Richards.

According to Smith, both Mattox and Clinton are frustrated candidates with solid resumes who can't adjust to facing what they believe to be a charismatic lightweight. I agree with that assessment. In fact, Hillary Clinton seems politically tone-deaf at times and her apparent failure to understand why Obama is winning is something that I hold against her as a candidate. I honestly do not think that she is as capable of dealing with the unexpected as Barack Obama.

At this point in the race

2008-02-21T23:20:00.000-06:00

I'm probably going to start posting some comments on political blogs stolen from this website.

Patburto Solis Gonzales

2008-02-13T11:22:00.000-06:00

As Kevin Drum notes, there's a story in the Atlantic about the firing of Patti Solis Gonzales which, along with some stories it links to, paints a grim picture of a candidate not even aware that her mismanaged campaign had financial problems until after Iowa and that she clung loyally to her loyal subordinate even though it was apparent to everyone that she wasn't cut out for the job.

Obama and Catholic Democrats

2008-02-07T14:56:00.000-06:00

Philip Klinkner at PolySigh notes that Barack Obama seems to have a "Catholic problem",which he dubs the "Catechism Gap".

Oversensitive

2008-02-05T16:28:00.000-06:00

Auguste at Pandagon isn't a fan of some Super Bowl ads.

Presidential Candidate Matching for 2008

2008-01-11T13:58:00.000-06:00

I took this quiz:

73% Barack Obama
72% Hillary Clinton
69% John Edwards
68% Joe Biden
64% Chris Dodd
58% John McCain
57% Mike Gravel
57% Dennis Kucinich
57% Bill Richardson
50% Rudy Giuliani
47% Mike Huckabee
47% Mitt Romney
44% Tom Tancredo
38% Fred Thompson
34% Ron Paul

2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz

Well, Obama is my first choice and Paul is my last choice, so it is accurate in that regard, at least.

Anti-Huckabee Catholics?

2008-01-08T09:53:00.000-06:00

Via http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/01/mike_huckabees_catholic_proble.php#commentsMatthew Yglesias, PolySign notes that Mike Huckabee did worse in Iowa in places where there were more Catholics.

Why Obama Is the Way He Is

2008-01-04T15:52:00.000-06:00

BooMan has an insightful post on how Obama's campaign has been non-confrontational by necessity.

Regardless, I haven't written anything (that I can remember) bashing Obama for his tone or style or lack of combativeness or partisanship. Many people I really respect, like Chris Bowers, have been almost obsessed with these aspects of Obama's campaign. It's surprised me. Obama and Bowers are like twins separated at birth, but Bowers has struggled to get past discordant rhetoric from the Obama campaign. In my view, Obama's rhetoric has been finely calibrated to reassure white people, the media, the Beltway, the business community, and the Blue Dogs and moderates. He took the progressives a bit for granted because, frankly, he had that luxury.

A Coalitional Theory of the Democratic Party

2008-01-03T09:06:00.000-06:00

osted to Open Left:

Recently, Chris Bowers asked if Obama represents a possible deal between progressives and the Democratic establishment. I suspect that this sort of analysis is oversimplified and that there are more than two main poles in the party. My hypothesis is that the Democratic Party functions as the sort of coalition that you might find in a parliamentary government.

This is only in the realm of hypothesis and hasn't been tested by analyzing data, but I suspect that the Democratic Party, at least at the elite level, can be broken down into several discrete power blocs. My guess is that the main groups could be called the Progressives, the Congressional Black Caucus, the New Democrats, and the Blue Dogs.

There's a lot to raise my suspicious in this direction. Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid seem to conduct Congressional business as if they are leaders of a fragile coalition that could fly apart at any moment. The saga of William Jefferson felt like the CBC acting as a separate party. The Hoyer-Murtha battle for House Majority Leader seemed like a New Democrat-Blue Dog partnership to oppose dominance by Nancy Pelosi and the Progressives.

The analogy isn't perfect. Since these aren't formal organizations, politicians are capable of being independent actors who don't align perfectly with the various blocs. But the schema makes sense. I'm sure there are political scientists who have analyzed how often members of Congress vote with each other. If my hypothesis is right, they will have identified groups of politicians who often vote together.

If this is all true, I have a few conclusions:

-A Democratic president with a Democratic-controlled Congress will still have to be able to negotiate with the party's various factions in order to pass an agenda

-To maximize their influence, progressives should caucus and agree to vote together on all legislation as a group and to negotiate compromises with other blocs within the Democratic coalition. This requires some Democrats stepping up as real leaders.

-Progressive primary challenges should focus on replacing members of the New Democrat Coalition rather than the Blue Dogs in order to strengthen the leftmost position when compromise is eventually sought

-The Democrats are ill-suited to being a minority party. Because they are effectively multiple parties joined together, the Democratic coalition falls apart when in the minority because there is not majority power to bind the coalition together

-If the U.S. shifted to a parliamentary system right now and the two-party system fell apart, a left-of-center government would probably resemble the current Democratic status quo in the House of Representatives, with a prime minister perhaps resembling Nancy Pelosi or perhaps Steny Hoyer.

Like I said, this is all an unproven hypothesis, but I think it does a lot to explain why Democratic politicians act the way they do and may be useful in predicting the success of various possible legislative strategies for making the country more progressive.

Not Quite the Nobel

2008-01-01T20:44:00.000-06:00

EthicsDaily.com has named Al Gore its 2007 Baptist of the Year.

Pius XII Sainthood Drive Stalls

2007-12-18T14:17:00.000-06:00

Via Reuters:

Vatican sources say top cardinals have advised Benedict to go slow on Pius's sainthood process because of the repercussions it could have on relations with Jews and Israel.

The Vatican maintains Pius did not speak out more forcefully against the Holocaust because he was afraid of provoking Nazi reprisals and worsening the fate of Catholics and Jews.

Ia it possible to have done enough to help Jews during WWII without having done the maximum possible? I say yes. This is not a claim that Pius did or didn't do enough; I just wonder if the threshold has been placed too high.

A Shift in Interpretation of the Establishment Clause?

2007-11-30T17:08:00.000-06:00

(Crossposted to Street Prophets)

Winnefred Fallers Sullivan is Associate Professor of Law and Director of the Law and Religion Program at SUNY-Buffalo. She recently posted an an adaptation of her keynote address from a conference on "After Pluralism".

In it, she suggests that contrary to the goals of both the political left and right, the American jurisprudential view on the First Amendment establishment clause is shifting because of a changing "religious anthropology" no longer rooted in a peculiarly Protestant view of religion (which she ties in part to anti-Catholicism).

Sullivan writes:

Yet the Nicholson case, when seen in the context of recent Supreme Court First Amendment jurisprudence, represents a larger shift, in my view, one not related to partisan politics. Obscured by the culture wars rhetoric around the faith-based initiative is a wider cultural shift to greater public acknowledgment of religion, an acknowledgment that is moving away from determination by “established” protestant models of religious life. Indeed, from the perspective of many religious communities, aspects of these pastoral care regimes may seem a troubling de-mystifying and naturalization of religion.

Taken together with recent decisions approving school vouchers as well as public approval of faith-based social services generally, the U.S. may be moving toward an acknowledgment of religious universality that has more in common with those countries in which the state, in spite of secularization and the de-privileging of state churches, continues to assume responsibility for the religious well-being of citizens. Religious freedom and non-discrimination are there often understood to be possible, even if not always realized, without separation in the austere American sense. As Grace Davie says about Europe, in contrast to the U.S., religion is there more often regarded as a “public utility” than as an active personal commitment by an individual. It is not necessarily about personal faith in a protestant evangelical sense. It is about getting the work of the public done, in orphanages, schools, hospitals and other charitable institutions, as well as about providing ritual and comfort for significant times in people’s lives. It depends on a different religious anthropology. And it is no less committed to religious freedom. Such an approach is feared by the left and the right in the U.S., but I think it may be happening nonetheless.

Here, she refers to an unsuccessful lawsuit by the Freedom from Religion Foundation challenging the constitutionality of the VA's chaplaincy program. Sullivan claims that we are seeing a growing "kind of religious universalism" which views religion in the abstract as a positive without differentiating between the different religions.

Sullivan cites the VA case as one of several "that move away from the high separationism of the mid-twentieth century towards what we might call a post-pluralistic acknowledgment of religion. While this is seen as establishment by some, by others it is seen as a benign establishment, permissible because no longer tainted by religious bigotry."

I find this to be a fairly interesting description of how people think about religion and politics. The notion of American views on secularism being colored by a Protestant heritage appeals to my postmodern soul. The characterization of a "particularly Protestant" understanding of permissible religion as "internal, chosen and believed" and may provide insight into how conservatives view Muslims. And I've often pointed to the possibility of differing worldviews of people from Protestant and Catholic backgrounds (even if they are no longer practicing those particular faiths) that affect how they view certain issues on both sides of the liberal-conservative divide.

This also puts a different spin on arguments about church-state issues on the left. For those who strongly believe in a Jeffersonian "wall" of separation of church and state, anyone who believes differently wants to turn the clock backward. However, in Sullivan's framework, those who advocate more acceptance of religion in public life (consciously or not) may see strict separationism as archaic and themselves as progressively understanding the realities of a post-pluralism society.

This Scares Me

2007-11-24T09:34:00.000-06:00

A diarist on DailyKos writes about Mike Huckabee's potential influence:

Say that Huckabee wins the nomination. I believe that we could see a similar re-orientation, where populism tended to be associated more with the Republican cause and the Democrats were considered more pro-business. What we'd have then is two parties that looked something like this:

1. The secular rationalist party, a.k.a. the Democrats, which would tend increasingly toward libertarianism.

2. The theocratic collectivist party, a.k.a. the Republicans, who would shift in the direction of economic populism while remaining extremely conservative on social issues.

This is pretty much my nightmare scenario for the Democratic Party. I get the willies whenever people start talking about libertarian Democrats. It's an oxymoron. Ugh.

So Frickin' True

2007-11-08T11:19:00.000-06:00

From Steve Gimbel at :
Philosophers' Playground:: "So, The Bell Curve is, like Ayn Rand's objectivism, a flawed attempt to justify in the minds of smart privileged white people why they shouldn't feel guilty about the inequities of society and would be wrong to lift a finger to help those who need it."

Comics Should Be Good! � Rudy as the Punisher?

2007-10-09T05:04:00.000-05:00

Via Comics Should Be Good!, the 2008 presidential hopefuls as comic book characters, according to Comedy Central's Indecision 2008.

Mike Gravel = Wolverine
Intense, outdoorsy misanthrope from the Great White North with little memory of his past -- possibly insane.

...

Bill Richardson = Captain Planet
A good idea in theory, but there's just something lame about him.

...

Rudy Giuliani = The Punisher
Italian American, native-New Yorker, people seem to like pretending he's a hero for some reason.

...

Ron Paul = Matter-Eater Lad
Getting a lot of internet buzz, but... c'mon.

Heh.

Canada's State-Supported Religious Schooling

2007-09-30T23:53:00.000-05:00

Did you know that Canada funds religious schools? (Well, I did, but my question was if you, my non-existent reader did.) Via the Christian Science Monitor, Rondi Anderson writes on how school funding is affecting the upcoming provincial elections in Ontario.

In the United States, there was state establishment of religion at the onset. Not at the federal level, since the Bill of Rights forbade it, but at the state level for many of the states. The language of the First Amendment was even crafted to ensure that it didn't outlaw the states' establishment of religion.

That establishment slowly went out of fashion. In Massachusetts, for example. disestablishment occurred because Congregationalists didn't like state money going to the growing number of Unitarians.

Adamson would prefer to scrap all funding of religious schools in Canada, but thinks that the status quo is better than funding similar schools for Jews, Muslims, and evangelicals. If Adamson really wanted to defund all religious schools, she should encourage the funding of all religions in the short term in order to make the entire system so poisonous that enough people want to get rid of it. (Which isn't to say that I think Canadians should scrap their system. I'm fairly tolerant of such measures, moreso than others on the American political left.)

Nixon Can Go to China, But Condi Can't Go to the Vatican

2007-09-19T18:35:00.000-05:00

Well, technically, the Castelgandolfo, according to the BBC.

Senior Vatican sources told the BBC the Pope does not normally receive politicians on his annual holiday at the Castelgandolfo residence near Rome.

But one leading Italian newspaper said it was an evident snub by the Vatican towards the Bush administration.

Reading between the lines, I would guess that the pope would receive a politician if there was a sufficiently important matter to discuss and that there is no way Rice could possibly have anything worth discussing.

I wonder which Vatican sources disclosed this information. The clear intent is that it be perceived as a "snub," whether or not it actually was one.

What do they expect the pope to do?

2007-09-15T18:46:00.000-05:00

Via the International Herald Tribune:

Austrian and other European Jews want Pope Benedict XVI to use his moral authority to stop Iran from developing the ability to produce nuclear weapons and prevent a "catastrophe for all of humanity," a Jewish leader said Wednesday.

The plea was included in a letter the pope received during a recent three-day visit to the Alpine republic, which began with a highly symbolic stop at Vienna's Judenplatz, or Jewish Square.

Copies of the letter were provided to reporters Wednesday at a news conference organized by Ariel Muzicant, the head of Vienna's Jewish Community.

....

The letter said that Jews were greatly concerned that 62 years after the Holocaust, Iran was "officially threatening the state of Israel with 'destruction and obliteration.'"

It goes on to ask the pope, referred to as one of the world's most important moral authorities, to do everything in his power to prevent a "possible catastrophe for all of humanity."

Muzicant declined to specify what he'd like the pope to do but said time was running out.

I, too, would like to know what Muzicant thinks the pope can do. Does he have specific actions in mind? If he thinks that the pope will stand aside and not speak against violence in the case of future war against Iran, that is unlikely.

I Heart Tucker Carlson

2007-09-01T14:02:00.000-05:00

Several people on the internets have been calling for the head of Tucker Carlson. Here's a dirty secret. Liberal as I am, I enjoy Tucker Carlson. I find him easier to watch than Chris Matthews. I think that he would be a fun conservative voice when partnered with a progressive on a left-right talking heads.

Bobby Jindal Vs. the Protestants

2007-08-22T10:11:00.000-05:00

Over at Crooked Timber, Henry Farrell looks at the the recent controversy over some old writings of Louisiana Republican Bobby Jindal.

There’s a lot of excitement in the netroots over a piece written by Bobby Jindal in which he tries to persuade Protestants of the benefits of Catholicism. After reading the piece in question, I’m at a loss to understand what all the fuss is about. It seems to me to be a standard – even banal – exercise in Catholic apologetics.

....

But if the netroots are blowing it out of proportion, the ‘Jindal on Religion’ website and accompanying TV ad, put up by Louisiana’s Democratic Party, are actively dishonest.

Farrell proceeds to argue that the quotes used are taken out of context, and I think he is correct. That being said, I believe that the Louisiana Democratic Party ought to take those quotes out of context for political purposes. Democrats underperform in elections because they suck at negative campaigning. That deficiency needs to be rectified.

The War on Science, Transgender Edition

2007-08-21T16:29:00.000-05:00

This account of a J. Michael Bailey, whose work on transgendered people was not well-received by the subject matter.

In his book, he argued that some people born male who want to cross genders are driven primarily by an erotic fascination with themselves as women. This idea runs counter to the belief, held by many men who decide to live as women, that they are the victims of a biological mistake - in essence, women trapped in men's bodies. Bailey described the alternate theory, which is based on Canadian studies done in the 1980s and 1990s, in part by telling the stories of several transgender women he had met through a mutual acquaintance. In the book, he gave them pseudonyms, like "Alma" and "Juanita."

Many scientists praised the book as a compelling explanation of the science. The Lambda Literary Foundation, an organization that promotes gay, bisexual and transgender literature, nominated the book for an award.

But days after the book appeared, Lynn Conway, a prominent computer scientist at the University of Michigan, sent out an e-mail message comparing Bailey's views to Nazi propaganda. She and other transgender women found the tone of the book abusive, and the theory of motivation it presented to be a recipe for further discrimination.

This controversy gets revisited by the conclusions of Alice Dreger, described as an "ethics scholar and patients' rights advocate".

Dreger is the latest to arrive at the battlefront. She is a longtime advocate for people born with ambiguous sexuality and has been strongly critical of sex researchers in the past. She said she had presumed that Bailey was guilty and, after meeting him through a mutual friend, had decided to investigate for herself.

But in her just-completed account, scheduled to be published next year in The Archives of Sexual Behavior, the field's premier journal, she concluded that the accusations against the psychologist were essentially groundless.

For example, Dreger found that two of the four women who complained to Northwestern of research violations were not portrayed in the book at all. The two others did know their stories would be used, as they themselves said in their letters to Northwestern.

The accusation of sexual misconduct came five years after the fact, and was not possible to refute or confirm, Dreger said. It specified a date in 1998 when Bailey was at his former wife's house, looking after their children, according to dated e-mail messages between the psychologist and his former wife, Dreger found.

This points to a chilling effect for those who want to do research in politically controversial areas. Eventually, the only people who will do research into anything with political implications will be scientists whose funding sources have an agenda.

If I Called It a Catfight, I'd Be Called Sexist

2007-08-12T22:13:00.000-05:00

Over at Firedoglake, Jane Hamsher complains about the low visibility of women bloggers and remarks that an announced installment of PBS' To the Contrary with Bonnie Erbe is having a panel on women bloggers without having an actual woman blogger on the panel.

In the comments, Jennifer L. Pozner, Executive Director of Women In Media & News rebutts:

Actually, Jane, your entire premise of this post is faulty. Erbe had a panel without any women bloggers? False. She had me. As (just one) part of my work as the director of Women In Media & News, I run the popular WIMN’s Voices group blog on women and the media, in which dozens of women blog about different aspects of media content, policy and advocacy. I was on the panel as a blogger, a media critic, a feminist non-profit director, and (yes) an attendee of YearlyKos who has a valid critique of the overwhelmingly white and male speaker roster. I never said on the show or anywhere else that no women spoke or were involved, and I believe I actually mentioned FireDogLake on the show (though I was often shouted down during the taping of the show and I haven’t seen it on air yet, so I’m not sure how the segment turned out). But the argument that a few prominent women involved means that there isn’t a gender equity problem is myopic. It’s similar to traditional all-white, all-male corporate boards of directors saying, “We don’t have a diversity problem - we’re crawling with those people” when they have one or two women and/or people of color on a large board. Yes, it’s progress — but it’s not equity.

I’ve read an interview you’ve done - can’t remember for which outlet or blog - where you implied that people who complain of marginalization of women’s voices online are off base because if women were better writers, people would read their blogs more. That implies that there is no institutional discrimination in this culture, and that American culture (online and offline) runs entirely on meritocracy. If only that were true. But clearly, not so much.

Whether we agree or disagree on that point, I do want to encourage you to actually check your facts before you post. I can’t believe the irony of you griping that Erbe’s show ignored you when in fact we did mention your very blog, and complaining that the show included no women bloggers when in fact the guest list included a woman blogger who was at YearlyKos (me). The group blog I write for and manage — WIMN’s Voices — has been around for about a year and a half and has been linked from and discussed on Huffington Post, Feministing, AlterNet/Peek, Echidne of the Snakes, Shakespeare’s Sister/Shakesville, Feministe, Broadsheet/Salon, Women’s Voices for Change, Our Bodies Our Blog, PopPolitics and many others, and has been successful in generating discussion in larger independent and corporate print and broadcast media. That you don’t even know that it exists, or know that I’m a blogger (that you could claim that Erbe’s show included no women bloggers when I was at the damn conference) illustrates my point about marginalization of women writers online.

Jane Hamsher has a one-line response:

I occasionally change my own oil. I don’t call myself a mechanic.

Pozner replies:

Are you seriously implying that just because our blog is only a year and a half old, I’m not a “real” blogger?

Because if that’s true, my friend, you are part of the problem. You’re saying that as a media critic I can’t hold the same critical lens toward online media as I do toward old media, and in particular that my point about the underrepresentation of women’s voices in power circles online is off base because, oh, YOU have a popular blog — but then you’re saying that I’m not actually a blogger because, why? I haven’t been doing it as long as you have?
How long do I have to have been blogging before I can claim to be a “real blogger” in your estimation? Is it totally insignificant that I singlehandedly created a platform for several dozen women to blog who might not have
otherwise? Does it make any difference that in 1996, I was involved in online feminist activism circles and women’s leadership listservs and community discussion groups connecting women all across the country who used the net to advocate against violence, for reproductive justice, against media
consolidation, for clean elections and campaign finance reform and other issues many years before anyone dreamed up the phrase “netroots”? (Do you think you, Markos and Matt Stoller created online activism?)

Or am I simply not allowed to have any sort of critique — and am I not allowed to call myself a “blogger” because you have the trademark on that identity, simply because you’re winning the online popularity contest?

I’m really shocked, Jane, that you’d be so hypocritical in complaining that you
and other women bloggers are supposedly being overlooked (in response to a discussion about how women are actually being overlooked), yet you would say I’m not a blogger. WIMN’s Voices has very healthy traffic. We have dedicated
readers who devour our posts. We generate discussion in the blogosphere. We generate discussion in the media. And we create space for a wide range of diverse women to monitor media. If you think I’m not a blogger simply because I’m critiquing your friends (or because I think it’s great that you have a popular blog and I say that when I talk about blogs, but I also say that attention to a handful of women’s blogs does not equal equity) then you’re
really slow. Which is surprising, considering that you are often a very astute writer.

And, Rootless2, about this:
Does it? To me it illustrates that all those women bloggers who you mentioned who are much more well known than you would have been good choices to invite to the panel. Why were you chosen as the sole representative of women bloggers?

“To The Contrary” is a half-hour public affairs show that runs three segments on air and then one web-only extra feature. This week, one of those topics was about blogging and YearlyKos. Typically, the show features politicians, journalists and leaders of non-profits. I was booked on the show as a media critic and as the head of a women’s media analysis, education and advocacy group — NOT at all as a “the sole representative of women bloggers.” In fact, I was booked for the show about two months ago, and they only chose to include blogging as one of the four segments they discussed a few days ago. It was a coincidence that I was there during the week of this blogging discussion, and it’s a good thing I was because at least they had someone on the show who does, indeed, blog, and who was able to say that there is not any one monolithic way to describe “the blogosphere,” that there are amazing women blogging all over the net, and that people who say there are no women bloggers aren’t really looking for us. Also, to another point: guests on public affairs programs need to be well informed about a wide variety of topics. I wasn’t brought on as a “blogger,” I was brought on as the head of a non-profit that works on media issues. I do happen to know that the show has taped an interview segment with a couple of well known women of the blogosphere, that will air at some point in the near future — hopefully more of these issues will be raised during that show.

I have to admit, it's really, really hard not to see this as Hamsher whining on some level about specifically her own personal non-involvement.

A Non-Manichean View of the Democratic Party

2007-08-12T02:37:00.000-05:00

Renee in Ohio doesn't have a dog in the upcoming Harold Ford-Markos Molitsas Meet the Press debate, finding one to be flat-out wrong and the other to be an "arrogant ass" who only cares about winning. Guess which one is which.

Catholic War Hypocrites

2007-08-10T00:30:00.000-05:00

Michael Joseph at Vox Nova calls out Father Richard John Neuhaus for his hypocrisy in criticizing U.S. bishops for being willing to meet with a group of Catholic Democrats to discuss the war in Iraq. He also questions Diogenes of Catholic World News.

Michael Joseph concludes:

It is a true shame when individuals such as Fr. Neuhaus and Diogenes, both of whom have a wide readership, either refuse to engage in rational discourse by villanizing the USCCB or deride the USCCB out apparent ignorance. In any case, Neuhaus and Diogenes are not reliable voices on this matter and each deserves to be called out for his very poor understanding of the relationship between politics and Catholic faith. One of the biggest challenges faithful Catholics in America must overcome is the perpetuation of the misinterpretation of Catholic social teaching conducted within so many so-called "orthodox" and "intellectual" circles. But I think we're up to the task of reclaiming our Catholic patrimony in the social sphere from those who distort and convolve it through the conceptual misappropriation of what Vatican II truly meant by the "autonomy of earthly things."

Anti-Catholicism in the Republican Party

2007-08-06T23:33:00.000-05:00

Sam Brownback and Mike Huckabee find themselves in a Christian catfight.

The current tensions stem from an e-mail message sent to two Brownback supporters by Rev. Tim Rude, the pastor of an evangelical church in Walnut Creek, Iowa. In the message, Mr. Rude, a Huckabee volunteer, compared the religious backgrounds of Mr. Huckabee, a Baptist pastor, and Mr. Brownback, who is Roman Catholic.

“I know Senator Brownback converted to Roman Catholicism in 2002,” Mr. Rude wrote. “Frankly, as a recovering Catholic myself, that is all I need to know about his discernment when compared to the Governor’s.”

Of course, Huckabee disavowed his supporter, as a candidate ought to do quickly and without much fanfare. Brownback, on the other hand, has had his campaign create a perception of whining. The absolutely wrong image for an aggrieved candidate to cultivate is that of a whiner, no matter how right one happens to be.

Shockingly, William Donahue of the "Catholic" League actually addressed this, writing:

Discernment. Evangelicals have it, and Catholics do not. But are those evangelicals who express themselves this way capable of discerning the difference between persuasiveness and abrasiveness? Do they really think all Catholics are rote-minded robots who let the Vatican do their thinking for them? We thought we’d gotten beyond such nonsense, but apparently some stereotypes are proving hardier than others.

“Like Sam Brownback, Mike Huckabee is a man of character, and as such he would never choose to be associated with such bigotry. The blame for this incident lies squarely with Rev. Tim Rude, pastor of the church. Unfortunately for him, he has now compounded his problem by saying that he did not intend his e-mail to be made public, and that in any event, ‘All I was trying to say is that Protestants should vote for Protestants.’ Great. But now that his gig is up—everyone knows about his stealth campaign against Brownback—the time has come for Rev. Rude (what a great name!) to fess up and apologize. He might also take this opportunity to explain his lack of confidence in the ability of Protestants to discern whom they should vote for in the election.

The purpose of the UN

2007-08-06T22:18:00.000-05:00

In response to this Matthew Yglesias thread, I note:

The purpose of the UN is to counterbalance the world's superpowers. Everything else is just fluff to keep the nations of the world something to care about to keep them involved. Of course, the US is the only superpower these days, so the UN is a weapon whose only real target these days is America, so I can see why neocons hate it.

The Papal Diplomatic Core

2007-07-27T05:00:00.000-05:00

Via Vatican Watcher comes this Economist article on the Vatican's diplomatic service.

Paranoid Jews Are Not Always In Danger

2007-07-26T20:48:00.000-05:00

So says Rabbi David Rosen, International Director of Interreligious Affairs of the American Jewish Committee and former Chief Rabbi of Ireland, who writes that the wider use of the Latin Mass is not a hand of the spectre of anti-Semitism that some would have you believe.

This Is What We Talk About When We Talk About War

2007-07-25T16:53:00.000-05:00

Zippy Catholic put up this interesting quote:

It occurs to me that the reason why antiwar activists are so strongly attached to the mantra of “Bush lied” (besides the reality that he and his officials did lie on numerous occasions) is that they are attempting to square a nation that embraced a manifestly unjust, unnecessary war with their confidence in the functioning of our system of government.

I find that it comes from some musings on lessons learned from the Iraq war by paleoconservative Daniel Larison. I want to highlight this passage:

As someone who opposed any invasion of Iraq from the day the idea was first floated (Jan. 29, 2002), I did not make many of the same mistakes that war supporters did, but I regret them all the same, since my failure to understand the political reality of my own country led me to make arguments in my letters and conversations that were not going to be very persuasive. Antiwar activists were often effectively arguing past, or rather above, the public. We were arguing the impracticalities and immorality of such a war; the other side could tap into a visceral desire for revenge and payback, regardless of the target. War advocates understood the irrationality of democracy (including the crowd-pleasing lie that democracies are naturally peaceful) very well and exploited it for all it was worth. Antiwar activists have been labouring for years under the delusion that popular attitudes can be affected by having better policy arguments and superior command of knowledge about a region. Current war supporting pundits have much in common with this approach, since the standard refrain of pro-war commentators is something like, “The American people will never approve of a policy of surrender,” just as some antiwar commentators might effectively claim (as I know I did) that ”the American people will never approve of a policy of aggression.” I was wrong then in my judgement of the public mood; they are wrong now.

There's a lot here that I agree with. I do blame the left for ineffective antiwar arguments based on a faulty understanding of human nature. However, this is also where I part from conservatives. The traditional conservatives look at the apparent stupidity of the masses and think that we must embrace aristocracy or some other elitist form of society to safeguard us from the ignorant many.

But the postmodernist in me embraces the irony of democracy, that we theoretically hand over power to those who are at times least in knowledge. As a student of the social sciences, I understand that ignorant doesn't mean incapable. I don't buy into the progressive myth that we can built a highly-educated and activate citizen democracy, so I don't plan action based on that flawed premise. I believe in leaders leading, not in populist uprisings.

So I find myself with a peculiar brand of liberalism where I don't really believe with the rank-and-file lefties that you might find at a place like Daily Kos in that I don't agree with some of their underlying assumptions about society.

Dershowitz < Peretz

2007-07-06T00:58:00.000-05:00

Over at the Washington Monthly, Kevin Drum nominates Marty Peretz for worst analysis of the Scooter Libby pardon. Peretz is just the bloggy cliff notes version of the Dershowitz column that he links. And what does the Harvard bigwig have to say?

This sentence made me laugh the most:

The trial judge too acted politically, when he imposed the harshly excessive sentence on Libby, virtually provoking the president into commuting it.

In the world according to Dershowitz, this was supposed involve a lengthy appeal process while Libby was on bail, with George W. Bush doing the obvious and pardoning him during his lame duck period at the end of his term with the appeal not resolved. Apparently, not letting Libby run out the clock with his appeal provoked Bush into pardoning Libby, as if it were the president's only real choice.

I am a Populist-leaning, Socialist-leaning Republican

2007-06-05T21:14:00.000-05:00

Not Republican as in GOP, though, thank God. I took this quiz. You can take it too, but take it with a grain of salt. It's a libertarian thing and the biases in wording are fairly obvious. I am somewhat skeptical of these descriptions.

According to the website, I can be broken down as follows:

Populist-leaning on the Liberal-Populist line:

Many who consider society excessively loose or irresponsible fall into this ranking, supporting certain measures to enforce a somewhat more rigid code of moral standards like blue laws, dry county laws, and so forth. The typical social conservative falls here.

Capitalist-leaning on the Capitalist-Socialist line:

Most Democrats and a few Republicans fall here. They are skeptical of corporate scandals, think that balanced budgets are a good reason to raise taxes, and want a more progressive taxation system. They view the estate tax and capital gains tax as necessary balancing devices against the power of the wealthy. They are skeptical or even adamantly opposed to free trade, and consider the IMF, WTO and World Bank to be closed, dangerous, undemocratic and serving the wealthy. They associate economic success with more government spending, low unemployment, and a trade surplus.

Republican on the Radical-Conservative line:

This includes a large bulk of modern-day American politicians, whether Republican or Democratic. This includes values of basic racial equality but not necessarily affirmative action. It's a strong rejection of racism and a strong embrace of democracy, but not into the social levelling or hyper-secularism of the democrat level.

Next Up, the Prius Popemobile

2007-06-05T20:01:00.000-05:00

Via BBC News, the Vatican will install solar panels on the roof of one building.

The deteriorating cement roof tiles of the Paul VI auditorium will be replaced next year with photovoltaic cells to convert sunlight into electricity.

....

Pope Benedict has criticised "the unbalanced use of energy" in the world.

Last year he said environmental damage was making "the lives of poor people on earth especially unbearable".

The Paul VI auditorium was designed by architect Pier Luigi Nervi and built in 1969.

The cement panels on its roof have deteriorated and were due to be replaced anyway, said Vatican engineer Pier Carlo Cuscianna.

When the 6,000-seat hall is not in use, the surplus energy will be fed into the Vatican power network.

The Vatican is considering placing solar panels on other buildings although St Peter's Basilica and other historical landmarks will not be touched.

This is probably how I would go about it if I wanted to make things more environmentally-friendly. It seems a shame to replace a perfectly good roof with solar panels, so the right thing to do is to experiment by doing one building first and seeing how it works out before committing yourself to redoing everything.

Of course, I've never been an early adopter of technology. I was years behind the curve in adopting CDs and DVDs. I wouldn't consider buying a hybrid car until the technology had proven itself with data on cars that have been on the road for five years. But that's just me.

Moderates in Turky

2007-05-16T02:48:00.000-05:00

This piece at TPMCafe is written by George Washington University sociology and international relations professor Amitai Etzioni.

In it, Etzioni notes that a constitutional amendment in Turkey will lead to an observant Muslim holding the presidency, where in the past the military has exercised a veto of sorts to insist that parliament appoint a secular head of state. Etzioni argues that imposed secularism goes against the Turkish majority and drives moderate Muslims into the arms of extremists.

Importantly, the Turkish majority favors a moderate Islamic society and is no longer enamored with a dominantly secular one. (After all, secularism was imposed on Turkey, in the first place, by a fierce autocrat and the military.) When the AKP won an outright majority of seats in Parliament in 2002, it became the first non-secular Turkish party to have done so in 15 years, signaling a significant religious attachment among the Turkish people at large, despite eighty years of state-imposed secularism. Denying the majority a political expression is likely to alienate these voters who favor a moderate Islamic government, pushing them toward the extremists.

Most importantly: the same change of strategy must be applied to much of the Muslim world. Large segments of it will not be satisfied with secularism; to counter Islamists it is best to support the moderate Muslims found in droves in nations such as Indonesia, Bangladesh and Malaysia, rather than merely secular parties. Just as Social Democrats were often a better antidote to Communists than the conservatives, so the texts and leaders of nonviolent, moderate religious parties are the most promising way to curb Islamists. Indeed moderate religious parties are found as key participants in numerous democratic societies in Europe and in Israel.

President Reagan used to say that God should not be kept out of the classroom—as if a bunch of educators could prevent his presence. Politicians should take note: they cannot keep God out of politics, either. The only choice they have is which of His messages they will object to if sought by the voters: those that sanctify suicide bombers and car bombs—the God of the terrorists—or those that call for humility, modesty, teaching of the scriptures and non violence? Those who call for jihad as a holy war to kill all the infidels, or those who see jihad as a spiritual journey of self improvement?

With the recent death of Jerry Fallwell, I use this moment to reflect on the Religious Right. The movement embodies a non-trivial percentage of the population. It would be wrong to disenfranchise them by imposing secularism with a heavy hand. Doing so has driven them to despise the state. Religious conservatives should have sufficient liberty that they feel they have a chance to fulfill their goals, or to create grudgingly acceptable compromises, through the democratic process. Not that they should have guaranteed success, just a guaranteed seat at the table.

Nelly on Don Imus

2007-05-08T19:39:00.000-05:00

Via noted poker theorist David Sklansky:

He was playing NLH last night at the Bellagio and I asked him whether he thought Imus should have been fired.

He answered that at first he didn't. But he changed his mind when Imus "instead of taking his medicine like a man" resorted to pointing fingers at rappers like him even though the the situations are not at all the same. I couldn't quarrel with that answer.

I Sort of Wish I Could Coerce Libertarians to Shut Up

2007-05-07T22:03:00.000-05:00

Not that expression of such a desire would sway any libertarian. However, Richard Chappell takes a look at property and coercion and some errors in libertarian philosophy.

The Rubicon That Must Be Crossed by the "Anyone But Hillary" Crowd

2007-05-07T17:56:00.000-05:00

There exists on the left a certain sentiment of "Anyone But Hillary." In this era of party unity, it isn't talked about much, but it is obvious from the Daily Kos straw poll that she is not an exciting candidate for a good segment of the Democratic Party.

Recently, Markos Moulitos wrote in the Washington Post:

In person, Clinton is one of the warmest politicians I've ever met, but her advisers have stripped what personality she has, hiding it from the public. Some of that may be a product of her team's legendary paranoia, somewhat understandable given the knives out for her. But what remains is a heartless, passionless machine, surrounded by the very people who ground down the activist base in the 1990s and have continued to hold the party's grassroots in utter contempt. The operation is rudderless, without any sign of significant leadership. And to top it off, a sizable number of Democrats don't think she could win a general election, anyway.

Take this in conjunction with the comments of blueflorida highlighted by Chris Bowers:

This has been described before many times but to put it in the simplest (Brooks-ian)terms: there are the children of 1972, the children of 1992, and the children of 2000. The children of '72 transformed the country culturally but were inept at the nuts-and-bolts of electoral politics and were oblivious of a conservative counter-revolution happening in less-urban parts of the country. They have been stuck in the attic by the children of 1992 for about 20 years, but were let out (with conditions) by the children of 2000.

The children of 1992 have nothing but contempt for the children of 1972, holding them responsible for the catastrophic presidential defeats of '68, '72, '80, '84, and '88. They currently dominate the party leadership and they hold as articles of faith the perception that modern America is basically a center-right nation that only votes for Dems if Dems confine their progressive message to pocketbook topics and embrace a basically conservative posture on crime and national security issues.

We've spent more than six years lambasting George W. Bush for not only being an incompentent, but surrounding himself with incompetents. Even if you take the Atrios line of liking Hillary but hating the people she surrounds herself with, you're left with a potential administration filled with retreads and apologists for Bill Clinton's presidency.

Earlier, Chris Bowers wrote back in February:

Hillary Clinton is extremely popular among the Democratic rank and file. The only way to defeat her is to have someone who is a more preferable choice, not someone who is merely an acceptable alternative. Democrats overwhelmingly like Clinton, and as such are only going to turn to other candidates they like even more, not other candidates they dislike less.

Bowers concludes that Obama and Edwards must build each other up, rather than tear each other down, but he misses the boat. Obama and Edwards must tear Hillary Clinton down to have a chance. And the first to fire a strong salvo at Hillary Clinton will have a chance to dominate political news converage.

And here in front of us is the Rubicon. Once crossed, there is no turning back. Its crossing can be delayed, but it has to be crossed inevitably if one seeks the prize. At some point in time, the "Anyone But Hillary" crowd must go on offensive, even if their chosen candidate or candidates do not. And in doing so, they should strongly consider throwing overboard the triangulating legacy of Bill Clinton and the "generation of '92". The Clinton years were not a great time for the Democratic Party and their mediocrity seems favorable only when placed next to the stunningly flawed Bush administration we have now. But (barring a spectacular and fortuitous collapse) no one is going to overtake Hillary Clinton without taking her down.

This Is Stupid

2007-05-06T19:15:00.000-05:00

Via MSNBC, a soccer game intended to promote interfaith dialogue has been cancelled.

Why, you may ask?

Church of Norway spokesman Olav Fykse Tveit said the imams refused to play against a mixed-gender team of priests because it would have gone against their beliefs in avoiding close physical contact with strange women.

The church decided to drop its female players, and the priests' team captain walked out in protest.

I'm sorry, but what did you think was going to happen? The Church of Norway, or that subset of it that was in charge of setting up the game, are complete and utter idiots who show a lack of awareness and sensitivity toward Muslims. Anyone with a brain in Norway would have either a) established well beforehand that it was going to be a male-only match or b) not scheduled the match in the first place.

The Seven-Step Program for American Right-Wing Catholics

2007-05-06T02:16:00.000-05:00

Over at Reasons and Opinions, Morning's Minion has this hilarious, tongue-in-cheek description of right-wing Catholics.

Bias Against Evangelicals in the Classroom

2007-05-06T02:06:00.000-05:00

The Washington post leads off the story with the tale of Missouri State social work major Emily Brooker, who was charged with discrimination for refusing to sign a class assignment consisting of a letter to state legislators supporting adoption by same-sex couples. Her lawsuit was settled, with the discrimination charge stricken from her record and her graduate school studies paid for.

The university president also called for an independent investigation by two outside scholars, the deans of social work at Indiana University and the University of Tennessee.

In a scathing report in March, they wrote that many students and faculty members at Missouri State's School of Social Work "stated a fear of voicing differing opinions," particularly about spiritual matters. They found such a "toxic" climate of intellectual "bullying" that they suggested shutting down the social work school and restarting it with a new faculty.

This doesn't surprise me. Being outside of the mainstream or being outside of the majority is inherently frightening. I don't believe that it is possible to make any minority group completely comfortable with being the minority.

The article also points to a possible measure of bias.

The other survey, by the San Francisco-based Institute for Jewish and Community Research, confirmed those findings but also found what the institute's director and chief pollster, Gary A. Tobin, called an "explosive" statistic: 53 percent of its sample of 1,200 college and university faculty members said they have "unfavorable" feelings toward evangelical Christians.

Tobin asked professors at all kinds of colleges -- public and private, secular and religious, two-year and four-year -- to rate their feelings toward various religious groups, from very warm or favorable to very cool or unfavorable. He said he designed the question primarily to gauge anti-Semitism but found that professors expressed positive feelings toward Jews, Buddhists, Roman Catholics and most other religious groups.

The only groups that elicited highly negative responses were evangelical Christians and Mormons.

"When we ask questions like this, we're asking the respondent to say how they feel about an entire group of people, and whatever image they have of that entire group comes through," Tobin said. "There is no question this is revealing bias and prejudice."

Cary Nelson, president of the American Association of University Professors, disagreed. What the poll reflects, he said, is "a political and cultural resistance, not a form of religious bias."

Nelson, a professor of English at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, said the unfavorable feelings toward evangelical Christians probably have two causes: "the particular kind of Republican Party activism that some evangelicals have engaged in over the years, as well as what faculty perceive as the opposition to scientific objectivity among some evangelicals."

William B. Harvey, vice president for diversity and equity at the University of Virginia, said that even if the survey has correctly identified a "latent sentiment" among professors, "I don't know that it is fair to make the leap . . . that this is manifested in some bias in the classroom."

....

Tobin, the pollster, acknowledged that his survey did not measure how professors act, only how they feel. But he said the levels of disapproval are high enough to raise questions about how evangelical Christians are treated.

"If a majority of faculty said they did not feel warmly about Muslims or Jews or Latinos or African Americans, there would be an outcry. No one would attempt to justify or explain those feelings. No one would say, 'The reason they feel this way is because they don't like the politics of blacks or the politics of Jews.' That would be unthinkable," Tobin said.

Tobin's point is very accurate. What would be the reaction if someone stated that distate for homosexuality was "cultural resistance" and not "a form of religious bias". As quoted, Nelson and Harvey seem defensive and unwilling to consider further study into the topic. Shouldn't they have the intellectual curiosity to see if there is actual bias in the classroom?

Watching Iraq for Religious Freedom

2007-05-05T19:34:00.000-05:00

Via USA Today: Iraq was added to U.S. religious freedom watchlist.

Citing gross violations of the rights of Sunni and Shiite Muslims, as well as followers of numerous minority beliefs, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom added Iraq to its "watch list" on Wednesday. Violations included arbitrary arrests, torture and rape.

Iraq joins Afghanistan, Belarus, Egypt, Bangladesh, Cuba, Indonesia and Nigeria on the list. Their designation is a notch below the designation "country of particular concern," which would make them subject to possible U.S. sanctions.

Three of the four Democratic appointees to the 10-member congressionally named commission differed with the Republican majority, arguing that conditions are so bad in Iraq the commission should have taken that next step.

The four Democratic appointees are:
-Ricardo Ramirez, the Catholic Bishop of Las Cruces, New Mexico
-Preeta Bansal, the India-born former New York State Solicitor General who is now a partner in the prestigious and mega-rich Skadden law firm. (Another current partner is Clinton lawyer Bob Bennett, while past partners have included Laura Ingraham and Eliot Spitzer.)
-Vice-Chair Elizabeth Prodromou, a professor in international relations at Boston University
-Chair Felice D. Gaer, director of The Jacob Blaustein Institute for the Advancement of Human Rights of The American Jewish Committee, who has an extensive resume in the field of human rights.

Some notable Republican appointees are:
-Denver archbishop Charles Chaput, who gained some notoriety in 2004 for statements about pro-abortion Catholic politicians
-Southern Baptist bigwig and radio host Eugene Land

I wonder which of the Democratic appointees didn't argue that Iraq should be added to Burma, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea), Eritrea, Iran, Pakistan, China, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam as "countries of particular concern."

Sounds Like a Threat to Me

2007-05-05T17:00:00.000-05:00

Via the BBC, Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe says that his country's bishops are on a "dangerous path".

He said they would be treated as politicians and not spiritual leaders.

He was responding to an open letter published over Easter, in which they warned of a mass uprising unless free elections are held.

"Many people in Zimbabwe are angry, and their anger is now erupting into open revolt," the letter said.

Mr Mugabe, a Catholic, said he would have told the bishops they were talking "nonsense" if he had seen the letter in church.

"Once [the bishops] turn political, we regard them as no longer spiritual and our relations with them would be conducted as if we are dealing with political entities and this is quite a dangerous path they have chosen for themselves," he is reported as saying in The Herald newspaper.

I believe that the Catholic Church has a legitimate role in speaking about politics and this is a valid example.

Deconstructing the MySpace Controversy

2007-05-03T15:25:00.000-05:00

Cross-posted to MyDD:

Instead of exploring the "he said/she said" aspect of this, I want to look into why people might feel the way they do about this much-talked-about scenario.

First, let's take the perspective of someone working in the Obama campaign who is confronted with a request for $40,000. How much is a campaign worker paid (if that worker is not a volunteer)? How does an annual salary of $60,000 sound? At least, that's that the average political campaign worker's annual salary after 10-15 years, according to the Princeton Review. Imagine that someone is asking for almost as much money as you make in a year for a few months of part-time work that your teenage son could have done. How does that make you feel? Wouldn't you feel like you're being extorted?

Now, let's take the perspective of some parts of the blogosphere. Let's face it, some people have dreams of fame and fortune by becoming a political blogger. There's a ton of Daily Kos drama caused by people angling for front pager gigs. The Obama campaign saying they refuse to pay x dollars sets a cap on how much one could possibly hope to make from blogging and citizen net activities that don't require a degree in computer science. This crushed some dreams, and people have responded angrily. Wouldn't you lash out if you felt that someone was threatening your valuation of your self-worth?

Sam Brownback on the Death Penalty

2007-04-26T14:08:00.000-05:00

From the Christian Science Monitor:

But it may be his "whole life" message that most sets him apart and at times puts him at odds with the mainstream of his party. A convert to Catholicism in 2002, he now largely opposes the death penalty – "except in cases where we cannot protect society from the perpetrator," such as Osama bin Laden.

But Brownback says he will not promote the curtailing of the death penalty as a campaign issue.

"I think it is tough for a state to teach a culture of life and still use this tool of death, and that's where I have difficulty with it. But I'm not going to be pushing it on an aggressive basis," he says. "I will be pushing issues like what we can do on reducing prison recidivism rates, which I've worked on a lot. I am going to be pushing what we can to do to help those in poverty in this country and poverty around the world, particularly what we can do to reduce malaria, what we can do to get more clean water supplies to people in third-world countries."

While I can't say that I would vote for him, I can say that I respect Brownback more than Rudy Giuliani, John McCain, Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich and most of the other Republican hopefuls.

Racial Profiling of Asians

2007-04-26T02:44:00.000-05:00

Tripmaster Monkey notes:

HAS THE “QUIET ASIAN MALE” joined the “angry black man,” the “shifty Latino” and the “fanatical Arab” as ethnic stereotypes to be wary of?

In the wake of the Virginia Tech shootings, racial profiling’s one of the fears on Asian-American minds, and at least one incident in upstate New York isn’t setting any of those minds at ease.

At SUNY Cobleskill, Tharindu Meepegama, a 20-year-old Sri Lankan was suspended for five days and required to undergo a psychiatric evaluation by the administration after someone noticed that his new Facebook profile featured a picture of him holding a shotgun and an away message from him saying he was tired of of people talking trash about his school. (Ironically, he was defending the school administration on an unrelated subject involving housing before they clamped down on him.)

As an Asian whose occasionally anti-social youthful behavior might have gotten me into even more trouble had I been born five years later, these sorts of things bother me. It could be me, after all.

Puerto Rican Statehood

2007-04-25T18:32:00.000-05:00

Commenter Thom at MyDD sums things up:

Commonwealthers cherish the separate tradition, language and history of Puerto Rico. Statehooders want to make Puerto Rico more like America. I'm a Commonwealther and a liberal. I recognize the danger to Puerto Rico's heritage posed by statehood. The official name of the relationship is not "commonwealth of the U.S." and certainly not "colony." The current relationship is officially "a free association" between two sovreignties, the U.S. and Puerto Rico. Under Free Association, the status quo, Puerto Ricans are American citizens, get some but not all the benefits of citizenship, and pay no Federal income taxes (paying taxes to Puerto Rico instead). One of the many arguments for Commonwealth on the Island is that statehood would put Puerto Ricans in the position of paying U.S. taxes on a Puerto Rican salary. Puerto Rico's economy is a Caribbean economy--it does not enjoy a fraction of the wealth or income of the poorest state, and statehood would place a crushing burden on individuals on the Island. One of many arguments for mainlanders to support Commonwealth is that the current statehood party is incredibly corrupt. The last statehood administration left office in 2000 under a blizzard of FBI investigations, subpoenas, indictments and convictions reaching into the highest levels of government. The U.S. Attorney at the time said, "The middle name of corruption in the Puerto Rico is [the statehood party]." The former statehood governor fled the Island--got up in the middle of the swearing in ceremony for his Commonwealther successor and was driven to the airport to go to Boston, and later moved to Virginia. Now he is back on the Island, a state Senator, a divisive force in the statehood party, threatening to seek the Governorship again, which would surely re-introduce to government his thieving cronies. By contrast, the current Commonwealther Governor, Anibal Acevedo-Vila is a smart, public-spirited, admirable leader whose 4-year term (prior to his current term as Governor) in the House as Puerto Rico's Resident Commissioner (and non-voting House member) won him many admirers and won many friends for Puerto Rico in Congress. The original article to which you linked refered to the frustration of mainlanders trying to line up the Puerto Rican parties to the Dem-Rep split on the mainland. It won't work. The parties in Puerto Rico are defined by their stand on political status--there is a statehood party, a Commonwealth party and an independence party. Those divisions cut across the kinds of divisions that define mainland parties. Finally, Puerto Rico represents the World Series of politics--every day in the paper there are 10-15 pages of political and policy news, turnout approaches 100%, campaigns are incredibly hard-fought. If you love politics, you will love Puerto Rican politics! Interesting Democratic Party side note, not referenced in the original article. While Sen. Ted Kennedy is a leading advocate of Commonwealth in the Senate (and he even cut a TV commercial for the election of Governor Acevedo-Vila), Senator Kennedy's nephew, Rep. Patrick Kennedy, was a leading proponent of statehood when he was chairman of the DCCC.

The original post by Chris Bowers feels to me like a bit of white paternalism, which I am sure is not his intent. Still, there is a sense that he knows what is best for Puerto Ricans. I'm not sure that he really understands why Puerto Ricans might choose commonwealth over statehood or independence, but at least he is asking for more information rather than forming opinions based on what he thinks the Iraqis....I mean, the Puerto Ricans think.

Means vs Ends

2007-04-24T21:06:00.000-05:00

Over at Democracy Arsenal, Ilan Goldenberg makes the following observation while looking at a recent Barack Obama foreign policy speech:

Too often progressives confuse ends (Keeping America secure) with means (multilateralism). Working with others is important but it shouldn’t be our top priority. Obama doesn’t drivel on about the UN, the ICC or international norms. Instead, he uses examples where working with others results in tangible and direct benefits to America’s interests.

I've made the suggestion in the past that tolerance isn't really a value or an end but rather a means to the actual end of a peaceful and sufficiently fair society. I might even go so far as to put democracy under the category of means rather than an end.

I don't think that it is feasible to claim that we must progress by certain means to reach a certain end. That is just too many variables to specify. Human behavior lacks that many degrees of freedom. Fairness can be defined primarily as a fair process or as a fair outcome. We often can't specify both a fair process and a fair outcome. We can hope that fair means lead to fair ends, but we can't force the future. Policy choices hinge upon deciding whether or not we care more about means or ends, and I don't think that enough people understand that we are forced to make such a choice.

If Tom Delay Calls It Treason....

2007-04-24T16:15:00.000-05:00

... then let me be a traitor. From Talking Points Memo:

I think Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are getting very very close to treason...For the Majority Leader of the United States Senate in a time of war, with soldiers dying on the ground, announcing that we have lost the war, is very close to treasonous. I looked it up while we were driving over here, the definition of treason, it's the betrayal of trust. I have never in my adult life, nor in my understanding of history, seen something so blatantly outrageous...I am blown away by this attitude of the Democrats. To me it's just a hatred of Bush...The American people are gonna eventually be fed up with this.

I have never in my life, nor in my understanding of history, seen a president so blatantly stupid and inept. I am blown away by this attitude of Republicans that Bush is somehow competent. It's not hatred of Bush, it's hatred of stupidity and ineptness in government. The American people are already fed up with this.

Hugo Schwyzer on Mental Illness

2007-04-24T11:15:00.000-05:00

Hugo Schwyzer has some personal thoughts inspired by the recent shootings at Virginia Tech.

Will the Latin Mass Offend Jews

2007-04-23T11:14:00.000-05:00

From a Reuters story s found on SignOnSanDiego.com:

The problem is that the traditional texts include passages that say the Jews live in 'blindness' and 'darkness' and pray 'that the Lord our God may take the veil from their hearts and that they also may acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ.'

The old liturgy, known as the Tridentine mass, also has none of the Vatican Council thinking that reversed long-standing anti-Jewish views in the Church and recast the Jews as what Pope John Paul liked to call the 'elder brothers' of Christians.

The Politicization of "Justice"

2007-04-07T07:51:00.000-05:00

The Carpetbagger Report notes how the Department of Justice under the Bush administration has handled civil rights cases on the basis of how they affect elections.

Is it possible to be pro-gay and pro-life?

2007-04-07T07:32:00.000-05:00

Jill at Feministe links to an article about Georgetown University Law Center not funding an internship at Planned Parenthood.

What I find interesting is this.

In the article, it says:

Daniel Hughes, president of the student group Progressive Alliance for Life, said he is among the students who have confronted administrators with concerns over summer internship funding. He said he threatened to take the matter to the church officials if action wasn’t taken. Aleinikoff said Georgetown’s decision had nothing to do with external pressure.

Hughes said the university is finally taking the appropriate action by honoring church teachings.

“I don’t think Georgetown needs to enact Catholic doctrine on every issue — that wouldn’t be desirable,” he said. “But the most bedrock Catholic teaching is the protection of life. No advocacy group that works against that principle should be supported by the university.”

Hughes said he doesn’t understand the complaints. Students, he said, need to realize that there are tradeoffs to coming to a Jesuit institution, such as the fact that some alumni donate because they support certain beliefs associated with the church.

“If this is finally a sign of them owning up to their commitment to honor the church, I’ll be impressed but surprised,” he said. “This seems like a grudging, half-hearted commitment.”

Meanwhile, the first commenter says:

Don’t quote me on this, but I’m pretty sure Dan Hughes is the Treasurer of Outlaw, Georgetown Law’s LGBT organization. At the very least, he helped organize the SLDN Lobby Day protest, which advocated revoking the military’s Don’t-Ask-Don’t-Tell policy.

Hughes states his opinion in states his opinion in this Georgetown Law Weekly article (linked to Google cache because the site is down or something)

Personally, I am all for “choice.” I believe in the right to choose (or not choose) sex partners and the right to choose birth control. What I do not approve of is unspeakable violence against another human person, a.k.a. abortion (not “choice”), done in the name
of personal convenience, the rationale for the vast majority of abortions.

Is Hughes a hypocrite, or does he have a consistent philosophy?

Was Alger Hiss a Spy?

2007-04-07T04:38:00.000-05:00

Via MSNBC:

Author Kai Bird said there was new evidence to suggest that the real spy was another U.S. official named Wilder Foote. Hiss was accused of feeding secrets to the Soviet military intelligence agency GRU under the code name Ales.

Meanwhile,

Timothy Hobson, an 80-year-old retired surgeon who was Hiss' stepson and grew up in the family home in Washington, D.C., said Whittaker Chambers, whose bombshell allegations against Hiss broke the case open, had lied about his personal relationship with Hiss and had never visited the Hiss home as he claimed.

Hobson said that during the time Chambers claimed to have visited the home, he was recuperating from a broken leg and met every person who came calling.

Chambers was a former American communist party member who spied for the Soviets during the 1930s. He defected before World War II and accused others of being spies, but his claims did not attract FBI interest until after the war. He joined Time magazine in 1939 and as a writer and editor was a severe critic of communism. He died in 1961.

"It is my conviction that he was in love with Alger Hiss, that he was rejected by Alger Hiss and he took that rejection in a vindictive way," Hobson said.

I've always found the reactions to Alger Hiss more interesting then the actual facts of the case. People often seem to have ideological reasons for believing that Hiss was or was not a spy rather than caring about the actual facts of the case. While they may recognize that trait in their opponents, they fail to see it in themselves.

Lesbians Denied Communion

2007-04-06T05:35:00.000-05:00

Via Yahoo News, two lesbians have been denied Communion in Wyoming after they appeared in the local paper.

"If all this stuff hadn't hit the newspaper, it wouldn't have been any different than before — nobody would have known about it," said the couple's parish priest at St. Matthew's, the Rev. Cliff Jacobson. "The sin is one thing. It's a very different thing to go public with that sin."

And that's really the problem, that they were very public about it. I wouldn't be surprised if their parish priest really did know that they were lesbians.

As a Catholic, I have a fairly simple rule for how I will conduct myself publicly, and it goes doubly because it is easy to link my real name to this blog and to many places that I post. I do my best to not say anything publicly that contradicts the beliefs of the Catholic Church as stated in the Catechism (if, hypothetically, there is anything that I disagree with, a point I am unwilling to concede).

For those of my readers who are Democrats (like me), I characterize my stance as an unwillingness to be a Joe Lieberman to my Church, to give you a metaphor that you can understand. I have a certain loyalty that choose to honor. And, truthfully, I do think less of Catholics who don't show that same sense of loyalty. But I am quite tolerant of Catholics who dissent privately. Heck, it's possible I may agree with them sometimes.

David Brody

2007-04-06T04:30:00.000-05:00

The LA Times reports on a blog run by David Brody, who happens to work for Pat Robertson's CBN. The blog is called The Brody File.

Frederick Clarkson Warns Against Atheist Kool-Aid

2007-04-03T05:12:00.000-05:00

Over at Talk To Action, Frederick Clarkson writes:

As Sam Harris wrote in his recent op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, by his formulation, extreme, moderate and liberal religious believers, whatever their differences are "every bit as delusional." This kind of rhetoric removes all possibility of rational conversation. Religious people get it that Harris, or anyone who thinks like him, consider them "delusional" so why would they ever see such people as trustworthy allies? By the same token, why would atheists, who considers themselves "rational," cooperate with people they consider "delusional?" Harris et al, are in the business, wittingly or unwittingly, of sewing distrust and wreaking havoc among people who ought to be allies. As I previously noted, if they did not exist, the religious right would have to invent them.

People who seek allies and coalition partners need to be able to come to the table, or indeed, to the blogosphere, with sufficient respect and tolerance of one another to earn a place at the table. This is true in any political movement or party, and is most certainly true of any and all coalitions stitched together to address the religious right.

It may be early to say, but it seems likely that the practitioners of smug, anti-religious, borderline eliminationist rhetoric -- will find themselves with fewer and fewer people who will consider them trustworthy political partners: And that, from where I sit, would be a shame. We all need each other to be strong in the face of the theocratic political movements of our time, and we need greater capacity for communication and understanding, not distrust and division.

Of course, the Religious Right has never had to invent a secularist straw man because these people have always existed, even before the (departed but not lamented) atheist Madalyn Murray O'Hair. I feel no need to "come to the table" with people of the ilk of Sam Harris. I don't trust them and don't respect them, for the reasons that Clarkson describes.

Some people say that Democrats shouldn't reach out to evangelicals or other social conservatives who might agree with a progressive economic agenda. Atheists in the style of Harris have nowhere else to go. We can, and should, take their votes for granted and not worry about alienating them.

Early Candidate for the IgNobel in Literature

2007-04-03T03:31:00.000-05:00

Via BookNinja:

On March 6, HarperCollins Children’s Books said that Jenna Bush, one half of a pair of twins better known for partying than publishing, would write “Ana’s Story: A Journey of Hope,” a book that chronicles the real-life saga of a 17-year-old single mother living with H.I.V. in Panama.

The Most Ideologically Representative States

2007-03-26T02:16:00.000-05:00

Cross-posted to MyDD:

I am delving into the recent huge Pew survey. This is the first thing that caught my eye.

On page 10-11, there are charts profiling Democrats/Democratic leaners and Republican/Republican leaners by state, grouped by primary date. Nationally, Democrats and Democratic leaners are divided into liberals (31%), moderates (44%), and conservatives (21%), while Republicans and Republicans leaners are divided into conservative white evangelical Protestants (26%), other conservatives (35%), and moderates/liberals (37%).

One simple measure of deviance from the national ideological breakdown is to sum up the differences between state figures and the national figures in each category. For example, South Carolina is +9 in conservative white evangelical Republicans, -6 in other conservative Republicans, -8 in moderate/liberal Republicans, , -6 in liberal Democrats, even in moderate Democrats, and +4 in conservative Democrats for a total of 33 with a Republican deviation of 23 and a Democratic deviation of 10. Some results after the flip.

Two important caveats. One, I did all my number-crunching by hand using pencil and paper because it would take less time than spreadsheet entry, and I did all arithmetic in my head without a calculator because that's how I roll. Second, Democrats in Delaware, DC, Idaho, Montana, both Dakotas, and Wyoming and Republicans in Delaware, DC, North Dakota, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wyoming lacked sufficient cases for Pew to list numbers. Also, the numbers are based on interviews between January 2005 and March 2007.

First, the least and most deviant Democratic states. Maryland is the least deviant with a score of 2. Second, with 3 is a tie. Florida and Illinois are unsurprising. However, the other is Iowa, which some people bash as an unrepresentative state. Based on ideology, the Democratic and Democratic-leaning voters there are actually quite representative of national Democrats. Arizona, Pennsylvania, Nebraska, Connecticut, and Wisconsin all have a score of 5, Virginia rounds out the top ten with a 6.

Unsurprisingly, the most deviant Democratic states include those with large numbers of conservative Democrats. At 36, Louisiana is the most deviant Democratic state, with 39% of Democrats and Democratic leaners claiming to be conservative. Next, tying at 25 are the state with the second-highest percentage of conservative Democrats, Mississippi, and the state tied for the most liberal Democrats, Washington. Newt, at 24 are the other uber-liberal state, Oregon, and another conservative state, Oklaoma.

The least deviant Republican states are Michigan (2), Ohio (3), Montana (3), Minnesota (5), and Oregon (5), while the most-deviant Republcan states are Utah with its 1% conservative white evangelical Protestant Republicans(57), Mississippi(57), New Jersey (45), Tennessee (42), Arkansas (38), and Alabana (38).

If you combine Republican and Democratic scores, the states that are most representative of national ideological breakdowns are Montana (6), Ohio (8), Illinois (10), Florida (11), and Michigan (11), Iowa (12), Pennsylvania (12). Unsurprisingly, this list contains a lot of potential swing states. Among early primary states, South Carolina is tied for 29th with a score of 37, while New Hampshire is 31st with a score of 41. South Carolina is more conservative than normal, while New Hampshire is actually more liberal than average on the Democratic side and skews heavily against evangelicals on the Republican side, so its early status may help diminish the chances of evangelical Republicans gaining a foothold.

I think the most interesting result overall here is that people who bash Iowa for being unrepresentative are probably overstating their case. In picking early primary states, it's has a smaller population than possibilities like Ohio and Illinois so may be better suited to grassroots campaigns, while it has a better travel infrastructure than Montana.

Further number crunching could involve comparing the numbers to weighted averages of likely Democratic and Republican states in the 2008 presidential election.

Sandy Berger vs Scooter Libby

2007-03-12T10:11:00.000-05:00

TigerHawk wonders why Sandy Berger got off easy compared to Scooter Libby, but doesn't jump at the idea of a Clinton conspiracy like conservatives.

My rank speculation is that Sandy Berger had information which would have made his trial even more painful for the Bush administration than for, well, Berger. I have no idea what that information would have been, except perhaps more detailed evidence that some Clintonite somewhere "warned" the Bush administration about al Qaeda or the specific tactics deployed on 9/11. Or perhaps Berger's defense would have required that the administration compromise information of current tactical or intelligence value, in which case the trial of Sandy Berger would have hurt the United States. Either way, it seems to me silly to complain about Libby's treatment compared to Berger's without knowing why we let Berger off with the equivalent of after-school detention.

This is some interesting speculation. I've never believed, as some conservatives do, that Berger was destroying material that reflected badly on the Clinton presidency. Knowing how this White House operates, that information would have been leaked long ago to use against political enemies.

But I'm not entirely sure that TigerHawk's idea of someone giving an al-Qaeda warning sounds right either, because we would have that hypothetical Clintonite popping up and saying, "I told you so."

Of course, if Libby's crime and Berger's crime were equal, then Berger should still get the lighter sentence for the simple reason that he ultimately pled guilty.

A Monk Comes Home to Vietnam

2007-03-10T14:11:00.000-06:00

The Christian Science Monitor writes on the return of a well-known Buddhist monk to Vietnam, a country in which Buddhists and other religious people are still getting harassed.

I Want My SI Swimsuit Issue

2007-03-10T13:59:00.000-06:00

Book Ninja passes along a story that librarians are unhappy that Sports Illustrated made an unannounced decision to not send its hallowed Swimsuit Issue to libraries (although they can request that it be sent anyways).

Is the Media Ignoring Arab Moderates?

2007-03-10T13:51:00.000-06:00

At TPM Cafe, M.J. Rosenberg takes the Washington Post to task for not reporting on a rare address to a joint session of Congress by King Abdullah of Jordan in which he said that the Israeli-Palestinian solution needs to be resolved to stop the spread of Islamic extremism.

Ajaxy goodness.

2007-03-09T10:19:00.000-06:00

Street Prophets has moved to the Ajax comment system used by Daily Kos.

Ex-Priest Tries to Confuse the Issue in Sex Abuse Case

2007-03-08T11:33:00.000-06:00

Via the Los Angeles Times:

A former Roman Catholic priest said in court Wednesday that the rights of homosexuals have been violated by a state law that makes it easier to prosecute gay pedophiles than heterosexual child molesters.

It apparently was the first time that gay rights had been introduced into the ongoing prosecution of current and former Catholic priests alleged to have molested children.

The state law in question imposes no time limits on prosecuting heterosexuals who force intercourse. But gays are subject to prosecution for sex acts with a child without limit regardless of whether the allegations involved forced or consensual sex.

Defrocked priest Michael Stephen Baker, 59, said the provision denies equal protection of the law to gay people. He cited a provision of the U.S. Constitution that has been used to advance racial and gender equality.

Baker is trying to claim that he had consensual sex. How one has consexual sex with an unconscious boy (as Baker is alleged to have done) seems a bit tricky to me. At least the Lamba Legal Defense and Education Fund, a gay rights organization, has the sense to recognize this as the homosexual equivalent of O.J. Simpson playing the race card.

Is Dick Cheney a Liar

2007-03-08T11:10:00.000-06:00

Gary at This Week in Oshkosh has serious doubts about aspects of the Cheney blood clot story based on personal experience.

Korean Christianity

2007-03-08T11:05:00.000-06:00

While the Philippines is a strongly Christian nation in Asia, the Christian Science Monitor look s at how Christianity became a significant religion in Korea.

Discrimination That the Catholic League Should Be Fighting (And Bill Donahue Is Nowhere to Be Found)bmit New Story

2007-03-05T15:18:00.000-06:00

Cross-posted to Street Prophets:

Law professor Howard Friedman's church-state blog Religion Clause notes a recent finding of anti-Catholic discimination that was also reported in the Washington Post.

A recent decision held that Father Henry Heffernan S.J., a chaplain at the NIH's Warren Grant Magnuson Clinical Center, was descriminated against by his superior, Methodist minister O. Ray Fitzgerald. Heffernan had been suspended for actions such as ministering to Catholic patients during his days off and refusing to take off-site chaplaincy courses, later given to other chaplains on-site, which were part of a continuing education requirement that Fitzgerald said were an effort to get rid of Heffernan. Fitzgerald was also reported as saying negative things about priests and that he would never hire another Roman Catholic priest. A Jewish chaplain was also fired after testifying in Heffernan's defense.

This looks to me like a clear attempt to put an uppity Roman Catholic priest in his place for refusing to accept a multi-faith concept of chaplaincy that acts as if all faiths are fungible.

And where is Bill Donahue and the Catholic League in all of this? There is nothing on the Catholic League website. Meanwhile, Google reports no hits when searching for "Bill Donahue" in conjuction with "Henry Heffernan," while the only hits for Heffernan in conjunction with the Catholic League yield blogs or religious websites which mention the two in separate posts or articles.

This incident makes two things abundantly clear: 1) There is an obvious need for a Catholic civil rights organization that acts as a watchdog against anti-Catholic discriminiation and 2) the Catholic League under Bill Donahue is not fulfilling this function, following the whims of a leader seeking attention and glory.

The State of Al-Qaeda

2007-03-05T08:31:00.000-06:00

The Christian Science Monitor should be required reading if you want to keep up on the Middle East. Here is an article about the current state of Al-Qaeda and its possible resurgence under the Bush watch.

Some critics of the White House are surprised that many of the recent warnings about Al Qaeda come from administration officials. In essence, critics say, the White House confirms something they've long held to be true: the central front in the war on terror is along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan, not in Iraq.

"We went to Iraq and left the serious terrorist problem to fester," Ms. Stern says.

On the subject of Iraq and Al Qaeda, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) estimates that less than 10 percent of the Iraqi insurgency consists of foreign fighters. Of those, most are suicide bombers.

Violence perpetrated by terrorists accounts for "only a fraction" of insurgent violence in Iraq, according to a written statement submitted to the Senate Armed Services Committee by DIA director Lt. Gen. Michael Maples. The attacks have a disproportionate impact on Iraq's stability because of the high-profile nature of the terrorist operations and tactics, the DIA says.

Right now, Al-Qaeda has been diminished, its leadership decimated. But it shows growth potential and there doesn't seem to be anything that the U.S. can do to stop a committed Al-Qaeda leadership from rebuilding because we partly abandoned the Afghanistan theater to go galivanting in Iraq.

This Is Why Apologizing For Slavery Is a Good Thing

2007-03-02T07:53:00.000-06:00

Don't be like the Japanese. According to BBC News, the prime minister of Japan said that there is no historical evidence that his country forced women to serve in army brothels during World War II.

The Diocese of San Diego Is Bankrupt

2007-02-28T05:41:00.000-06:00

USATODAY.com reports that the San Diego diocese plans to file for bankruptcy, according to Bishop Robert Brom. It will be the fifth diocese to do so, joining Tuscon, Portland (Oregon), Spokane, and Davenport (Iowa). Bishop Brom claims that it is a necessary move for fiscal responsibility, while critics claim that it is intended to delay court cases.

Kenneth Eng Hates Blacks

2007-02-28T02:54:00.000-06:00

A columnist at a San Francico weekly has caused a stir aafter writing a column called "I Hate Blacks".

His reasons include:

-- "Blacks hate us. Every Asian who has ever come across them knows that they take almost every opportunity to hurl racist remarks at us."

-- "Contrary to media depictions, I would argue that blacks are weak-willed. They are the only race that has been enslaved for 300 years."

-- "Blacks are easy to coerce. This is proven by the fact that so many of them, including the Rev. Al Sharpton, tend to be Christians."

That's a fairly....interesting opinion about Christianity.

Can There Be a Conservative Literary Theory?

2007-02-28T01:46:00.000-06:00

Scott Eric Kaufman of The Valve writes about it on his blog Acephalous
here and here.

Here's his conclusion:

In this respect, I think the multiculturalist have cornered the cultural traditionalists, forcing them into a position either visibly incoherent (the false universalism of Shakespeare) or spectacularly racist (Dead and White, That's What's Right! Dead and White, That's What's Right!). The latter's utterly untenable in this political climate; the former's philosophically incoherent and intellectually dishonest in the extreme. They may have people whose goals seem consonant with theirs, like Harold Bloom, but were they to read Bloom, they'd find him equally objectionable to the critics they'd hoped he'd replace.

Sorority-Style Politics

2007-02-28T01:30:00.000-06:00

Over at TPM Cafe, Jessica Valenti wonders if the feminist movement doesn't want too many new members so that the old guard can maintain ownership by accepting only people like themselves.

Similar things have been said about the African-American community. And I suspect that once the unifying cause of the Iraq War and the Bush presidency is no longer there, we'll see the same with respect to the left blogosphere.

Why Russell Arben Fox Is Not Pro-Life (But Not Pro-Choice Either)

2007-02-27T02:02:00.000-06:00

Scott Lemieux at Lawyers, Guns, and Money points to this Russell Arben Fox post at In Medias Res in which he discusses his ambivalence over abortion.

I don't think that it is at all obvious that abortion should be legal or that abortion should be illegal in the way that slavery and racial discrimination against blacks are wrong. From this viewpoint, I'm a bit more tolerant of people on the other side because they're not evil, mustachioed movie villains willingly choosing to do bad.

I found Fox's excerpt of an email from Crooked Timber blogger Harry Brighouse interesting:

[I should tell you about] my experiences at abortion clinic defences in the late 80's and early 90's. I used to be much more confident than I am now that abortion was permissible, and was in a milieu which participated in the defences--I must have gone to 15 or so in my time. I HATED them for several reasons. The most striking were these--I hated being in a demonstration in which the police were on our side; I hated being in a demonstration in which my side was visibly composed of wealthier more privileged people than the other side; and I hated the fact that I knew that, my socialist contingent excepted, the people on my side were less committed to my ideals of social justice than many of the leaders of the other side; who were often leading lay Catholics and Catholic priests whom I'd seen at meetings and demonstrations in support of our Central America work and helping to organise community support for strikes of low paid workers (this was in Southern California)--you never saw the NOW or NARAL people at such things.

What Kind of People Would Do This?

2007-02-24T19:44:00.000-06:00

The Catholic News Agency reports that someone duct-taped CD players under the pews of a New Mexico church, setting them to play obscene recordings in the middle of an Ash Wednesday Mass.

The Anglican Debate

2007-02-24T07:06:00.000-06:00

The LA Times gives the basics of the gay debate within Anglicanism.

Jews Are Democrats

2007-02-24T06:44:00.000-06:00

Speaking of Matthew Yglesias, he notes that American Jews are fervently opposed to the Iraq war.

Among Jewish Democrats, a whopping 89 percent say the war was a mistake. The rest are on Joe Lieberman's staff and will probably be switching parties soon.

In the words (well, word) of Glenn "Instapundit" Reynolds, "Heh."

Over at MyDD, Jonathan Singer also looks at the data.

Who Lost Cambodia?

2007-02-24T06:31:00.000-06:00

Matthew Yglesias takes on one of my pet topics, the right-wing canard that liberals lost Cambodia to the Khmer Rouge (a sub-argument of "liberals lost Vietnam"). People tend to ignore that the U.S. bombing campaign helped destabilize Cambodia and smooth Pol Pot's rise to power and they tend to forget that the Vietnamese are the ones who kicked out the Khmer Rouge, leading to a war with China which harmed Vietnam's infrastructure.

St. Robert De Niro?

2007-02-16T21:56:00.000-06:00

The Guardian reports that Opus Dei is interested in a biopic of its founder, Saint Josemaría Escrivá de Balaguer. The producers have already expressed interest in De Niro and Antonio Banderas.