Sex sells! (Helena school board edition.)

by: Jay Stevens

Wed Sep 15, 2010 at 17:56:54 PM MST

It removes an earlier plan to teach kids in first grade that people of the same gender can love each other, and strikes plans to teach second-graders it is hurtful to make fun of gay people by calling them names. Instead, the proposal stress current policy against bullying of all kinds - such as harassment for sexual orientation and many other reasons....

Also gone from the plan is an earlier proposal to teach, starting in grade five, different types of acts included in sexual intercourse.

It also makes sure that starting in fifth grade educators are clear that abstinence from sex is a "healthy choice" and "the only 100 percent effective way" to avoid pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Other sections on general sex education remain.

They'll still be teaching nutrition. According to the Matt Gouras report, "sex education advocates still gave the revised proposal a warm review." Here's a copy of the revised curriculum (pdf), complete with edits. So much for the process being done in secret, eh?

Both Pogie and Jamee Greer were tweeting the event. Pogie: "Twice sections have been removed because 'they have been misrepresented.' How is that an argument to remove it?" Just goes to show, if you don't like something about a policy, make sh*t up about it. Works like a charm, apparently.

Jamee Greer: "Board thanks community members who have gotten invovled, and heartened by the passion behind this.  They want to see the community involved in everything at the same level, including drop out rates and attendence." Again, sex sells. How do you gin up outrage about policies on dropout rates or attendance? And, yes, I realize the board was being facetious.  

The First Amendment does not protect you from the consequences of what you say

by: Jay Stevens

Tue Sep 07, 2010 at 07:24:45 AM MST

A few of the less stable righties are dang furious someone dares criticize their God-given right - nay, necessity - to burn heretical books in the public square. 'Cause they're out to kill us all, and burning their favorite book will show them!

Whatever. What's more interesting to me is John Hinderaker's reaction:

...I personally am not in favor of burning Korans. My advice to the Florida church would be, don't do it.

Still, is it not highly problematic when a senior military officer warns American citizens against exercising their undoubted First Amendment rights?...

Of course, the First Amendment only prohibits the establishment of a religion by government. Which is where we came in--there is a fundamental difference between my telling Terry Jones, senior minister at the Dove World Outreach Center, that a mass Koran-burning is a bad idea, and General Petraeus saying the same thing. Especially when Petraeus, probably the most respected person in the federal government, warns that the likely effect is to endanger our troops. In many contexts, taking actions that endanger the troops would be regarded as giving aid and comfort to the enemy, a concept that Petraeus came uncomfortably close to endorsing.

Um...? Where were these *sshats for the last nine years, when their political, military, and blogger friends were saying the same thing about anti-war liberals? Only it turned out we were right about Iraq, and these people are wrong.

Hinderaker brings up the comparison between rightie's reaction to Park51 and their reaction to Petraeus' statements - but while he dodges the hypocrisy, the Mahablog tackles it head-on:

...in the case of Park51, the arguments against the "rightness" of it are not just subjective; most of them are unadulterated bunk. There is no rational reason to not build an Islamic Center on Park Place. The building was functioning as a mosque, a place for Islamic prayer services, for several months before the controvery kicked off, and it didn't bother anyone until a few hotheads decided to raise a stink about it.

But in the case of the Quran burning, there could be real consequences. U.S. troops could die. The effort in Afghanistan, into which this nation has poured considerable blood and treasure, could be set back.

Whatever. This isn't meant to be a post about the efficacy of the Afghanistan mission. IMHO, it's a black hole. And the Florida church is free to say what it wants - although they're not free from the criticism that should flow naturally from their decision to burn Qurans, because Petraeus is probably right when he says rightie wingnuts are putting troops at risk with their manly chest thumping.

That's the thing here. You hear a lot from conservatives about how their speech is prohibited because lefties often criticize it for being racist, homophobic, or just plain stupid. But what they're really angry is that their racism, homophobia, and stupidity actually has consequences.

Tell me sweet little lies

by: Jay Stevens

Thu Sep 02, 2010 at 10:31:07 AM MST

There are scenarios in which tagging your political opponents with smears can be effective, but I don't see any evidence that the particular apocalyptic "my enemies are totalitarian madmen" strain of Birch/Beck/Goldberg conservatism has helped anyone win any elections....

This stuff doesn't win votes anyone because, after all, it's a form of preaching to the choir. Which is fine-the choir needs some sermons. But there's no real upside in lying to the choir. Political movements need to adapt to the actual situation, and that means having an accurate understanding of your foes. You need to see them as they actually are so that you know the right way to respond. Either underestimating or overestimating their level of viciousness and evil can lead to serious miscalculations. Which is just to say that getting this stuff right is more important than coming up with funny put-downs.

Er...come again?

Now, I'm not sure where Yglesias' attention is, but it seems to me the 2010 midterms are all about the kind of "apocalyptic" conservative rhetoric Yglesias claims doesn't win elections. Maybe Birtherism hasn't caught on, but you do get the sense that the recent health care reform is going to be judged by rightwing extremist rhetoric - a "socialist" program? -- and don't even get me started on climate change!

That's the thing, when extremist rhetoric is expressed "within mainstream discourse," as Tristero notes, it shifts "acceptable ideas further to the right."

Sure, it's silly to believe Obama wasn't born in this country, but having that idea out there enables "moderates" to declare, with something resembling a straight face, that they take Obama at his word when he says he's a Christian. By any rational standard, that's a wacky thing to say, but compared to out and out Birtherism - which, remember, was deliberately mainstreamed not by a raging lunatic but by the "well-respected" and "intelligent" Lou Dobbs - it's a somewhat reasonable position to hold in re: the "Obama legitimacy controversy."

Essentially that's what I was getting to the other day when I took offense at Sherry Devlin's false dichotomy, pitting "fact" against "opinion." Abandoning the factual integrity on the editorial page opens the door for rightwing extremist rhetoric and the "crazy lie."

Can you think of any "crazy lies" being discussed in mainstream discourse? Obama as socialist? As Kenyan? As Muslim? Health care reform as "socialized medicine"? The Tea Party isn't racist, Obama is? Climate change is a conspiracy theory? I'm sure I could reel off a half-dozen more if I put half a brain towards the exercise. The point here isn't that these are accepted, it's that the crazy lies sow doubt and uncertainty, and suddenly we're not debating Keynesian economics and strategies to extract ourselves from economic recession, we're debating whether Obama's a Muslim - which would grossly irrelevant even if he were. Which he isn't.

Tristero:  

One of the most useful techniques in the rightwing repertoire is The Crazy Lie. And we still haven't found any effective riposte to it - or at least, any effective rhetorical counter-strategy that mainstream politicians would be willing to use. Matt's failure to understand how incredibly effective this tactic has been for illiberals, and how debillitating it has been for liberals, is simply astonishing.

This ain't no party. This ain't no disco. This ain't no serious effort to persuade based on the truth. This is, as far as the right is concerned, about getting power, holding on to power, and extending power.

There's the rub. Republicans are good at treating elections and policy as a game that has winners and losers, and progressives still, for the most part, consider politics as a civic exercise in governing. Yglesias thinks that will enable us to prevail in the future. I wish I were so optomistic.

The real "most annoying fallacy on earth"

by: Jay Stevens

Thu Aug 12, 2010 at 11:52:30 AM MST

"It's not the religion. It's the people who are fundamentalists. Religion is not violent."

How many times have you heard that or some variation thereof?

These days, the line usually serves as a moral equivocation about Islamic fundamentalists' suicidal and murderous proclivities.

I'm happy to agree that Christianity, Hinduism, Judaism, even Buddhism have martial beliefs which can serve to foster violence. But it's foolish to assume that each fundamentalism of each religion is somehow equal. Each faith is backed up by a different set of scripture and associated theological texts. Religions are different: They say different things about the role of women; about when war is just; about what you can eat; about who and how you can marry; and about a lot else besides....

It stands to reason that, if religions have different scripture, different role models, and different theological readings flavored by local histories, their position on the use of violence for proselytism would each be different. (And, again, a caveat: I concede Christianity has a rich history of proselytism by force, although I would argue it is rooted more in Christianity's theological and historical emanations, while the same coercive proselytism is, in the Koran, more embedded within the text of scripture itself.)

For starters, I agree with Kavulla that religions aren't all some amorphous blob that all act in the same way. But, still, the shorter Kavulla is this: Islam is bad, Christianity is teh awesome.

Which is probably neat consolation for the folks who, over the years, have been stoned, flogged, tortured, drowned, burned, strangled, and gassed for not being Christian. Oh, wait! I forgot! That's about "historical and theological emanations," not Christianity itself! In short, Christian violence is result of erroneous and egregious misreading of scripture.

But then, so, too, is Islamic terror:

We need a phrase that is more exact than "Islamic terror". These acts may be committed by people who call themselves Muslims, but they violate essential Islamic principles. The Qur'an prohibits aggressive warfare, permits war only in self-defence and insists that the true Islamic values are peace, reconciliation and forgiveness. It also states firmly that there must be no coercion in religious matters, and for centuries Islam had a much better record of religious tolerance than Christianity.

Like the Bible, the Qur'an has its share of aggressive texts, but like all the great religions, its main thrust is towards kindliness and compassion. Islamic law outlaws war against any country in which Muslims are allowed to practice their religion freely, and forbids the use of fire, the destruction of buildings and the killing of innocent civilians in a military campaign. So although Muslims, like Christians or Jews, have all too often failed to live up to their ideals, it is not because of the religion per se.

Armstrong notes that bin Laden - as is "almost every fundamentalist movement in Sunni Islam" - was inspired "by the writings of the Egyptian ideologue Sayyid Qutb," not mainstream Islamic thought, so "there is good cause for calling the violence...'Qutbian terrorism.'" It's kind of like pointing to the Westboro Baptists, Leviticus 20:13, and d*mning all of Christianity for it. Armstrong also notes that Qutb formed his radical and violent teachings during a 15-year stint in an Egyptian concentration camp, so it's hard to separate his views from the social and political events of the time. That is, the "historical and theological emanations" of the twentieth century.

The irony here is this: it's the secular advances of religious tolerance, democracy, the concept of individual liberty, the tradition of Western law, etc & co, that form the elements of Western civilization that we find agreeable, not Christianity. We know Christianity didn't produce those things: we have ample evidence that Christianity provided the intellectual basis for irrationality, intolerance, and violence. That's not to say that Christianity - combined with social and political "emanations" - didn't abet or even enable the rise of these secular values; I suspect religions' texts defining the structure of religious authority does influence the movement or evolution of ideas. Still, it's a bit disingenuous, even dangerous, to go about proclaiming the natural and universal superiority of your favorite religious text.

Essentially what we have here is Kavulla trying to create universal reasons why his particular and  personal beliefs are true. Personally, I don't get into ideas of "universal law." I believe in principles that communities create (and that I create), but I also recognize that people and principles change, evolve. Isn't that why we should constantly question ourselves? Isn't that why we should always strive to learn, to remain curious and open-minded?

Douthat's nanny state

by: Jay Stevens

Mon Aug 09, 2010 at 09:00:23 AM MST

So what are gay marriage's opponents really defending, if not some universal, biologically inevitable institution? It's a particular vision of marriage, rooted in a particular tradition, that establishes a particular sexual ideal.

This ideal holds up the commitment to lifelong fidelity and support by two sexually different human beings - a commitment that involves the mutual surrender, arguably, of their reproductive self-interest - as a uniquely admirable kind of relationship. It holds up the domestic life that can be created only by such unions, in which children grow up in intimate contact with both of their biological parents, as a uniquely admirable approach to child-rearing. And recognizing the difficulty of achieving these goals, it surrounds wedlock with a distinctive set of rituals, sanctions and taboos.

The point of this ideal is not that other relationships have no value, or that only nuclear families can rear children successfully. Rather, it's that lifelong heterosexual monogamy at its best can offer something distinctive and remarkable - a microcosm of civilization, and an organic connection between human generations - that makes it worthy of distinctive recognition and support.

I'm not going to quibble here -- he's essentially saying gays are icky, and forming lifelong sexual relationships around breeding is the way we've always done it -- which is all fine and good, and he's free to feel that way if he wants. No one's forcing him to marry a man and raise an adopted child. But where it gets weird is that Douthat is arguing that the state to enforce his view of marriage, that it must use its authority to prevent gays from starting families.

Why? What danger does gay marriage represent that the state must coerce same-sex couples away from lifelong commitments? What could be so important?

Why, the fate of Western civilization, of course. According to Douthat, monogamous, life-long commitments are directly tied to the fate of "Western civilization." It's not only gay marriage that threatens this "unique and indispensible estate," but "serial monogamy" (not to mention philandering spouses, aged singles, and childless couples, apparently). (But then gay marriage has grown out of Western traditions of tolerance and individualistic expression, has it not? Maybe it's gay marriage that's the inheritor of Western civilization, and its banning the sign of sharp turn towards...oh, I dunno...religious fundamentalism?)

But what the cost of allowing other kinds of relationships exist isn't exactly clear. The danger is...other kinds of relationships will exist!

Here's the question, though: should we use the power and authority of the state to uphold tradition? Do we ban ballpark visitors who don't stand after the top of the seventh? Do we jail those that introduce themselves with their left hands? Should those men that don't pay for dinner at the first date be prevented from dating forevermore?

One of the favorite epithets hurled against liberals for favoring infrastructure improvements that ensure, say, public education or affordable healthcare, is that they are creating a "nanny state." Whatever. It's a fun pejorative to underscore conservatives' self-perceived manliness, but, really, isn't the kind of government that conservatives seem to favor - government that forces certain types of behavior, speech, and thought - isn't that far, far closer to their bugaboo nanny state than anything liberals have ever come up with?

Update: Glenn Greenwald points out a couple major fallacies with Douthat's argument that I thought about, but wasn't smart enough to include in the post.

First, because the law allows an act doesn't mean it will become accepted; nor does using the law to uphold "Principle X" mean Principle X will prevail.

Second, the court case surrounding Proposition 8 "did not decree that there are no legitimate moral, theological or spiritual grounds for viewing heterosexual marriage as superior." That is, you can both approve of the ruling and still think heterosexual marriage is teh awesome.

Greenwald:

They just can't misuse secular law to institutionalize those views or coerce others who don't accept them into having their legal rights restricted based on them.  But if they're as right as they claim they are, they shouldn't need to coerce others into acceptance through legal discrimination.  Their arguments should prevail on their own.  The fact that they believe they will lose the debate without that legal coercion speaks volumes about how confident they actually are in the rightness and persuasiveness of their views.

Taking over the world, one bike at a time

by: Jay Stevens

Thu Aug 05, 2010 at 13:34:59 PM MST

Republican gubernatorial candidate Dan Maes is warning voters that Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper's policies, particularly his efforts to boost bike riding, are "converting Denver into a United Nations community."

"This is all very well-disguised, but it will be exposed," Maes told about 50 supporters who showed up at a campaign rally last week in Centennial.
Maes said in a later interview that he once thought the mayor's efforts to promote cycling and other environmental initiatives were harmless and well-meaning. Now he realizes "that's exactly the attitude they want you to have."

"This is bigger than it looks like on the surface, and it could threaten our personal freedoms," Maes said.

Seriously?

The bicycle is the ultimate symbol of an egalitarian democracy. A bike is cheap. It doesn't require gasoline or other expensive fuel to ride. You don't have to pay expensive registration fees to ride a bicycle. It emits no pollutant. Bikes are easy to ride, and much safer than cars - if you don't ride in traffic. Bicycles need less infrastructure - a small concrete or packed dirt path will do. Bicycles thrive in pedestrian-friendly urban communities.

They may possibly save the world.

It's the automobile that controls us. We're essentially all forced to have a car. Because of our tax-funded infrastructure and our modern zoning laws and our egregiously underfunded public transportation systems, in most places you need a car to work, eat, and live. It's Exxon and BP that own us, not the United Nations.

But...seriously? This kind of late-night AM radio conspiracy is what we have to battle...from a Republican gubernatorial candidate? It doesn't matter if he's making it up, pandering to the crazy right, or just plumb nuts, the point here is that is all too common in contemporary politics, from climate change to health care reform, a group of political participants isn't interested in limiting the debate to what's real.

In a sense, it's sort of brilliant. They're going to places most rational people won't even go near. Even discounting it engages teh crazy, legitimizes it.

But how do you counter it? Make up your own sh*t?

Sheer cowardice

by: Jay Stevens

Wed Jul 21, 2010 at 08:27:29 AM MST

And then Sherrod was forced to resign from her job by Ag Secretary, Tom Vilsak.

Frankly, it wasn't surprising to learn that Breitbart's video clip was snipped from a longer speech in which Sherrod was actually making the exact opposite point that Breitbart and conservatives were accusing her of. In the full speech, Sherrod ends up helping the white farmer and was forced to confront and overcome her own racism, allowing her to "'realize that I needed to work to help poor people' regardless of whether they were black, white, or Hispanic."

The revelation of the full context of the speech made the NAACP, which initially condemned Sherrod's remarks, to admit they were "snookered" by Breitbart.

In fact, the gulf between Breitbart's accusation and reality was so large that even some conservative bloggers noticed it. Jonah Goldberg: "I think she should get her job back. I think she's owed apologies from pretty much everyone, including my friend Andrew Breitbart." (Goldberg goes on to claim Breitbart didn't edit the clip, and wouldn't have run it if he had known the full context. Of course, that didn't stop Breitbart from airing his infamous ACORN videos. Breitbart is a partisan hack of the worst magnitude, a lying sack of sh*t, and could use a boot in his *ss. Of course, we always overlook the faults of our friends, don't we?)

The real story isn't Breitbart making sh*t up. That's old news. Nine times out of ten, when you see some "breaking" scandal from a conservative blog, it's crap. (Like the recent Journolist "conspiracies.") It's not rocket science. Krugman:

I mean, there's a history here: ACORN, Climategate, Vince Foster, Whitewater, and much much more. (Someone recently reminded me that the GOP held two weeks of hearing on the Clinton Christmas card list.) When the right-wing noise machine starts promoting another alleged scandal, you shouldn't suspect that it's fake - you should presume that it's fake, until further evidence becomes available.

The real story is the craven reaction to Breitbart's clip. The DC crowd caved. Even if Sherrod is offered her job back, it won't change the initial cringing.

Digby, as always, nails it:

They are telling wingnuts everywhere that all they have to do is gin up a phony controversy (especially about a black person, apparently) and the administration will fire them so as not to shake confidence that they are "fair service providers."

This is sheer cowardice.

Backbone has always been an issue of contention between the netroots and DC insiders as long as I can remember. Personally, I've often argued that if you shout your progressive values - and fought for them, even amidst conservative chest-thumping - you will be surprised at the results. People will like you. And the Obama presidential campaign was the triumph of that claim. The president ran on an open, progressive platform centered around healthcare reform, climate change legislation, fair taxes, and an end to the war in Iraq and Bush's unconstitutional anti-terror policies, and he won. Handily.

In some ways, I blame the quick transfer of power from the GOP to Democrats between 2006 and 2010. Too many Democratic veterans - journalists, staffers and politicians - are left over from the 1990s and beyond, and have the all-too familiar habits from that era. If anything, this should underscore that our movement is still young; we need to work to put good candidates in office whenever possible, and change the temper of debate and policy-making in Washington.

Rage as political movement

by: Jay Stevens

Mon Jul 19, 2010 at 09:21:46 AM MST

I do believe that American democratic institutions are particularly durable and resilient. But it is at least possible to envision a scenario in which, after years of high unemployment and declining living standards, the Tea Party essentially takes over the GOP. And it is possible to see how, over a series of election cycles, that movement could plant a brand of extremism in the center of American politics that would fundamentally change America's identity. It would very likely be characterized by a series of negatives: being anti-intellectual, anti-foreign, blustering in its assertion of an increasingly fragile American superiority, unwilling to engage with the rest of the world on environmental policy, nuclear disarmament, or human rights. A tapestry of rage defined by what its practitioners oppose rather than support.

I do think that simple demographics are on our side, and we'll be a solidly progressive nation in a decade or two. That is, unless the recession deepens, and then all bets are off.

Born to be wild: cognitive dissonance, conservatives, and the Great American Socialist Experiment

by: Jay Stevens

Sun Jul 18, 2010 at 20:14:14 PM MST

...the impulse toward denialism must be fought if conservatism is to prosper in a century when environmental issues will assume an ever greater profile on this increasingly hot, parched, crowded planet. Otherwise, the movement will come to be defined--and discredited--by its noisiest cranks and conspiracists.

Sounds good! I mean, I'm no free-market conservative...but if someone can posit a free-market solution to global warming (any solution!) and sell it, I'm all ears!

But the interesting point here is when Kay examines the psychological readiness among conservatives - who are otherwise, according to Kay, so practical when it comes to policy-making - to believe in wild illogical claims about climate change conspiracies:

But there is something deeper at play, too--a basic psychological instinct that public-policy scholars refer to as the "cultural cognition thesis," described in a recently published academic paper as the observed principle that "individuals tend to form perceptions of risk that reflect and reinforce one or another idealized vision of how society should be organized ... Thus, generally speaking, persons who subscribe to individualistic values tend to dismiss claims of environmental risks, because acceptance of such claims implies the need to regulate markets, commerce and other outlets for individual strivings."

In simpler words, too many of us treat science as subjective -- something we customize to reduce cognitive dissonance between what we think and how we live.

Why, yes...that does make sense. I'm sure I've been victim to similar bits of cognitive dissonance, sure.

In the case of global warming, this dissonance is especially traumatic for many conservatives, because they have based their whole worldview on the idea that unfettered capitalism -- and the asphalt-paved, gas-guzzling consumer culture it has spawned -- is synonymous with both personal fulfillment and human advancement. The global-warming hypothesis challenges that fundamental dogma, perhaps fatally.

"Unfettered capitalism"? "Spawned" the "asphalt-paved, gas-guzzling consumer culture"?

Come again?

If there's any part of our lives that's been more underwritten and centrally planned than our asphalt crusin' gas guzzling, I'm not aware of it. The construction of the nation's highway system wasn't the result of free-market pressure by consumers looking for someplace to drive cars. It was a huge government-subsidized project to build highway and paved road infrastructure largely at the behest of corporate magnates who needed a market for oil and automobiles, and rigged  taxation and public funding to derail (pun intended) the streetcar and passenger train system already in place.

Calls for a green economy and transportation system represents nothing new, as far as government ventures are concerned. And, if it were up to me, it wouldn't involve any extra funding. If I were dictator, I'd simply start trimming money earmarked for highway projects, and giving it to mass transit projects. And, frankly, in building a green economy, we have a chance to do so openly and democratically, and not at the behest of corporations

But that just underscores the cognitive, dissonance, right? I mean, resistance to climate change legislation isn't opposition to a conspiracy of environmentalists looking to destroy American industry; instead, it's a blind defense of a kind of American socialist experiment that went horribly wrong. Admitting that the last century of car culture was a big mistake implies admitting it's nothing but a big government project, even if it does feel free-spirited to roll your window down and stick your elbow out the window while you drive 278 from Jackson to Dillon...

You're too well off! (Unless you're rich.)

by: Jay Stevens

Sat Jul 10, 2010 at 09:05:06 AM MST

Billionaire owners can afford to run their leagues however they wish. But in the real world it makes little sense to punish success or reward failure. Yet that's exactly what the federal government's tax policy does.

According to a recent report by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, in 2007 (the most recent year for which figures are available) the top 20 percent of earners paid 70 percent of all federal taxes. The bottom 40 percent of earners paid no income tax.

The only way you can make this argument is if you conveniently narrow its scope to federal income taxes. That's right, you have to leave out the payroll tax, property taxes, various sales taxes, and local, state, and federal fees - all of which hit the working- and middle-classes the hardest. And you have to ignore that taxes on capital gains - income earned from investments - has been steadily whittled down, which directly benefits the richest among us. And that's also ignoring the byzantine tax credits and loopholes created for people with capital to slip out of paying any taxes. In 2008, the GAO reported that "72 percent of all foreign corporations and about 57 percent of U.S. companies doing business in the United States paid no federal income taxes for at least one year between 1998 and 2005."

In short, to make this argument, you have to deliberately ignore actual tax policies. In reality, we do not have a progressive tax system. Instead, we have a system that's been deliberately engineered to redistribute income from the poorest to the richest.

And the premise of the article, that income rewards good work is laughable on its face. It's like the author has lived in a box his whole life. Money rewards money, not success. The unregulated financial system created the current recession - which collapsed on defaulted mortgages...for the rich - yet hits working- and middle-class families the hardest. Wealth isn't a measure of an individual's ability, it's too often the result of  having all the doors of society - education and economic opportunity - opened by money. Our nation's fiscal policy is aimed at propping up the wealthy, creating economic safety nets that allow the rich to take ill-conceived risks without having to suffer any consequences.

Ordinary taxpayers end up shouldering the bulk of costs of oil spills in Alaska and the Gulf or the medical bills of workers and their families suffering from asbestosis and other health conditions related to industrial pollution. Ordinary taxpayers bail out huge, multi-billion dollar investment banks when they lose their shirts at the blackjack table.

But Feulner's article should serve notice that, once again, the conservative lackeys of big business are sharpening their pencils in preparation to turn the facts upside-down: the rich are poor, the poor are rich, and the problem is that you have too much money.

The last train to Sowell-ville

by: Jay Stevens

Tue Jun 22, 2010 at 16:24:28 PM MST

In our times, American democracy is being dismantled, piece by piece, before our very eyes by the current administration in Washington, and few people seem to be concerned about it.

Now...I'm confused. Shouldn't this make Sowell happy? Remember this from the same columnist back in 2007?

When I see the worsening degeneracy in our politicians, our media, our educators, and our intelligentsia, I can't help wondering if the day may yet come when the only thing that can save this country is a military coup.

Of course, what Sowell is suggesting is that Republicans are teh awesome and deserve a dictatorship so as proceed freely with "life-saving" torture and other neat unconstitutional and tyrannical stuff of Republican design. Frankly, I don't know what's more ridiculous: Sowell, or his fans who consider themselves "thoughtful" and profess "great respect" for the man.

Mineral Co. Candidate Vaunts Conservatives' Buffet-Style View of Constitutional Laws and Rights

by: Montana Cowgirl

Wed Jun 02, 2010 at 20:38:50 PM MST

It made me wonder which laws Ornelas would choose not to enforce, and if the freedom to pick and choose which laws are valid applies to the rest of us or just Ornelas himself.

Anyway, there seems to be one overarching concept that is consistent among conservatives and unites their various factions. Perhaps we could call it the Kountry Kitchen Buffet-style Konstitutional interpretation.

Though the US and MT Constitutions make no reference to selectively applying laws and rights, it's somehow perfectly OK to pick and choose which rights are awarded and which laws to enforce?  This concept is similarly manifested in the way many conservatives pick and choose which parts of the Bible to follow.

For example, Lev. 25:44 states that indeed we may possess slaves, both male and female, provided they are purchased from neighboring nations. It appears that this applies to Mexicans, but not Canadians.  Not sure what the distinction might be.  

Or consider the former mid-level state government worker turned ED of the Republican party who NOW believes government is irresponsible-after he's had his turn at the trough.

The right to privacy?  Sure, it's yours if you've got the right anatomy. The examples go on and on.  Arizona anyone?

It has yet to be seen how voters will react to these kinds of selective interpretations of values, freedoms, rights, and laws.   Personally, I haven't heard anybody clamoring for leaders who pick and choose what part of the Constitution applies to them and what applies to the rest of us.

Immigrants don't steal jobs

by: Jay Stevens

Tue May 18, 2010 at 05:47:18 AM MST

Yglesias:

But of course when you look at the politics of this issue, none of this is reflected. The people clamoring to "control the border" aren't recent low-skill immigrants from Mexico. It's very rarely native born high-school dropouts either. Rather, the people upset about immigration tend to be white high school graduates, a group that has a lot of conservative opinions about many issues but generally benefits from high levels of immigration.

Kevin Drum suggests that immigration opponents' opposition "...is rooted less in economic concerns and more in cultural resentment and language angst." Which isn't really accurate, either, given the number of immigration opponents that proudly point to, say, German, Irish, or Italian immigrant ancestors.

It's racism. Not the overt, old-fashioned segregation and lynching kind...it's the face of a kind of new racism, in which a handful of people, no doubt feeling threatened, confused, or annoyed by the myriad and rapidity of change - economic, cultural, moral, or technological, and not all of it positive - cling for self-identity to a highly politicized vision of the mythic American past, which, at its center, includes a racial and ethnic identity. Obama does not belong to the mythology, nor, apparently, does the most recent Miss America - a Muslim-American woman who "usurped" the "rightful" owner of the crown, Arizona-immigration-policy-supporting Miss Oklahoma. A "real" American doesn't speak with an accent, drive the wrong car, worship the wrong God, or veer from the views of the conservative punditry.

And I do think there's an economic component to this resentment that's written into the mythology as the "Protestant work ethic," but is probably more about the fear of immigrants slicing off a too-generous helping from the US government's budget pie. It's no coincidence that the areas of the country most hostile to civil and immigrant rights are also the most federally subsidized. And it's no coincidence that Reagan's pairing of federal welfare abuse with single black mothers resonated so sharply with many white, middle-class voters.

Whatever. Let's just say that distrust of immigrant populations runs deep, and all the evidence in the world that new Americans actually benefit the US economy will change neither the canard associating immigrants with job loss nor any anti-immigration views.

I don't think that word means what you think it does

by: Jay Stevens

Wed Apr 28, 2010 at 06:59:27 AM MST

I linked to a Jamelle Bowie post that said immigration law doesn't affect the demographic group that composes the Tea Party "movement," but it isn't just that these folks only fight for the "liberties" that primarily affect them, it's also that the use of the words "freedom" and "liberty" are code words for a conservative political agenda, not actual belief in, you know, liberty or freedom.

Tax Day!

by: Jay Stevens

Thu Apr 15, 2010 at 10:26:13 AM MST

(Image brazenly stolen from the Missoulian's Twitter feed.)

While we wait in breathless anticipation for the Missoulian's live Tweeting of Missoula's Tax Day protests, here are some facts for Tax Day:

A majority of Americans think the amount of taxes they'll pay this year is fair. And by "majority," I mean more than 60 percent of all Americans, including Republicans. Heck, a plurality of Tea Baggers think their tax rate is fair! Which is especially interesting, given what Tea Baggers (wrongly) think about our nation's taxes.

The total cost of the Republican Congressional obstructionism to the American taxpayer: 1.32 billion dollars. Now, that's what I call "waste."

The "Tea Party Express" - that bus touring around the country and whipping up Tea Baggers everywhere - is not the grassroots rally it's made out to be. It's actually a PAC run by Republican operatives.

Fox News, despite Rupert Murdoch's statement that his network "shouldn't be supporting the Tea Party," is actively participating in Tax Day protests. Sean Hannity is even going so far as front-lining a fundraiser for the Cincinnati Tea Party.

Tea Baggers fear socialism, but love Social Security and Medicare.

A recent NYTimes/CBS poll confirms what we knew all along: Tea Baggers are predominantly angry old white dudes. Besides hating poor people and blacks, they're a bit delusional. Check out this question from the poll results: "Regardless of your overall opinion, do you think the views of the people involved in the Tea Party movement generally reflect the views of most Americans, or not?" A whopping 84 percent of Tea Baggers said their movement "reflect the views of most Americans," while only 25 percent of Americans said the same thing. And four percent of Americans have actually attended a Tea Bag rally or have given money to Tea Baggers.

And now for some opinions:

John Cole: "This is just a Republican operation, plain and simple, and you'll watch the tea partiers go to bat for their Republican and Wall Street masters the next couple of months as we try to pass Financial reform.

"For chrissakes- the tea party idea came from Rick Santelli- a broker. Anyone who thought these guys were mad at Wall Street was engaging in magical firebagger thinking, and some of us told you that from the get-go."

FDL's Thers: "Probably the best thing that has thus far happened to the Tea Bag Party Movement would be the Tiger Woods fucking a lot mega-scandal, for the simple reason that without Tiger, the Tea Bag Party Movement would be the most tedious, trainwrecky, make-pretend important thing to have made normal people want to kill themselves over ever since the OJ trial or, I don't know, that Peaches Browning shit. I mean, Christ, what is there to say about a "movement" that spendspretty much all of its energy screaming about how it really and for true isn't jam-packed with crazies?

"Well, you can say that it's boring, is what you can say about it, because most of what they do is snivel about how oppressed they are, and that is a very wearying class of behavior to be annoying us with....

"To keep it simple, there's Fox News America, there's Village America, and then there's Fucked-Over America. As a citizen of that latter region, I'm getting pretty damn Fed Up."  

The demise of climate change is greatly exaggerated

by: Jay Stevens

Fri Apr 09, 2010 at 09:15:15 AM MST

Climate science, even at its most uncontroversial, could never motivate the remaking of the entire global energy economy. Efforts to use climate science to threaten an apocalyptic future should we fail to embrace green proposals, and to characterize present-day natural disasters as terrifying previews of an impending day of reckoning, have only served to undermine the credibility of both climate science and progressive energy policy.

Citing flatlined public support for belief in climate change, Nordhaus and Shellenberger advocate moving away from using immediate weather events - especially natural disasters - as a basis for supporting good, progressive low-carbon energy policy that's in our nation's "economic, national security, and environmental interest." (However, they never mention what line of reasoning should be used to support said policy.)

I'm down with avoiding using specific weather events to support climate change. That's something I can get behind. But that's not why I received the link. The reader sent the link to discourage me from mentioning climate change at all when I write about energy, as if somehow we've reached a state where the doubt of enough misinformed Americans trumps scientific reality, as if somehow the state of the climate were a battle of wills, not levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.

Of course, that's a foolish notion. For one, policy should not be based on irrational public opinion. As Todd Tanner writes in New West, most climate skeptics are "past the point where scientists can convince them or where logical arguments can persuade them," and that they've become ideologues, and whether they're driven by religion or politics or their distrust of the science is ultimately irrelevant." Tanner:

Here's what we need to know. The science is clear and unequivocal. We are dumping huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, and all that carbon is warming the planet and making our oceans more acidic. Our dependence on fossil fuels has created a worldwide crisis that threatens every single aspect of our lives.

And, yes, wouldn't it be great if we could find some rhetorical silver bullet that utterly convinced the country that we need to wean ourselves off of our fossil fuel addiction - if not for the carbon, say, but for the deadly air pollution? Of course, I don't even agree that talk around climate change has failed just because a handful of people still claim it doesn't exist. A vast majority of Americans believe the US government should put a "great deal" (pdf) of effort into dealing with global warming, and a plurality believe the US sign on to an international treaty to "reduce significantly greenhouse gas emissions." If this is failure of message, I'd love to see the numbers on a successful public campaign. (Numbers, by the way, courtesy of Tanner.)

But the fact is that there are deep-pocketed people out there who have a strong interest in burning fossil fuels, who will work actively to combat any effort to change our energy infrastructure, and who will sow misinformation and doubt among the citizenry and who will politicize health and safety to thwart reform. That is, it doesn't matter what rhetoric you use to support progressive energy policy, you will be attacked. It's better to ignore the concern trolls and forge on ahead with values that most Americans share, like a clean and healthful environment and a better future for our children.

Climate change exists. We need to do something about it.

The death of Cap and Trade

by: Jay Stevens

Fri Mar 26, 2010 at 07:43:18 AM MST

In today's New York Times:

Today, the concept is in wide disrepute, with opponents effectively branding it "cap and tax," and Tea Partyfollowers using it as a symbol of much of what they say is wrong with Washington.

Mr. Obama dropped all mention of cap and trade from his current budget. And the sponsors of a Senate climate bill likely to be introduced in April, now that Congress is moving past health care, dare not speak its name.

"I don't know what 'cap and trade' means," Senator John F. Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, said last fall in introducing his original climate change plan.

Say, what?

The Tea Party's pro-corporate elites

by: Jay Stevens

Thu Mar 18, 2010 at 10:34:10 AM MST

Wrong:

Last Thursday, Montana Attorney General Steve Bullock was served with a lawsuit filed by an organization "dedicated to fighting the radical environmentalist agenda" and a Bozeman-based Tea Party activist challenging the state's century-old ban on corporate political spending.

The suit, which also names Commissioner of Political Practices Dennis Unsworth, follows the U.S. Supreme Court's controversial Jan. 21 ruling that blocked the ban on corporate political spending, a ruling Bullock opposed.

The plaintiffs are the Colorado-based Western Tradition Partnership, which calls itself "the leading organization fighting the anti-jobs, anti-taxpayer policy agenda of extreme environmentalist front groups," and Bozeman's Champion Painting, owned by Ken Champion, a member of the Gallatin County Campaign for Liberty and the Bozeman Tea Party. Champion, according to the lawsuit, "is concerned with the way inflation, taxation, and spending are exploiting, impacting, and bankrupting America and Montana's small businesses," and he seeks to spend corporate funds to support candidates with similar political beliefs.

Program director of Montana Conservation Voters notes that the Western Tradition Partnership "would like to eviscerate the very laws that protect Montana's clean air, cold rivers, and public health..."

"I'm pretty nervous about Exxon or Arch Coal or someone else pulling out the stops and airing TV ads in state legislative races where individuals can only contribute $160 each, and where candidates are teachers, farmers and other regular folks."

Of course Exxon or Arch Coal won't run the ads themselves, they'll have the Chamber of Commerce do it for them.

Handing the reins of government to corporations is hardly my idea of "freedom." But based on the rhetoric of the Tea Partiers and other radical conservatives, it's apparent that they have already abandoned any notion that they have any civic responsibility for the state of their government.

And I'm still confused by the news that SCOTUS Justice Clarence Thomas' wife is starting a Tea Party chapter. As Andrew Cohen notes, her husband is in large part responsible for the government and its interpretation of the Constitution:

What part of the Constitution does she believe no longer means anything? What role does she ascribe to the Supreme Court, and to her husband, in making this so? To what particular "place" would she like to bring the Constitution and who would she like to help her along the way? What part of our current constitutional structure does she believe is leading us toward "tyranny?" And just exactly how does she define that word, tyranny? The same way Thomas Jefferson did or the same way Justice Clarence Thomas now does? And who in official Establishment Washington really fears tyranny anyway?

The idea of someone so close to power, so close to interpreting the Constitution, can lead a chapter of a populist "revolt" against a government based on its relationship to the Constitution is completely surreal.  

The limping sophistry of climate change denial

by: Jay Stevens

Tue Mar 16, 2010 at 11:14:28 AM MST

One thing a scientist must know is how ignorant we are about a lot of things; otherwise, we don't need scientists to discover new stuff. But the remark points to a naive hubris that is pretty pervasive among a "consensus" in the scientific world.

Just fifty years ago, the few believers in "continental drift" were derided by the geologic establishment as kooks on the fringe of science (if not worse). But evidence accumulated, and the theory, repackaged in the '60s and '70s as plate tectonics, is now recognized as the grand unifying theory of earth science.

So-called "Progressives" have a tendency to evaluate everything in life as if it were a deterministic, zero sum game. What goes up, must come down. In with the good, out with the bad. What goes around, comes around. Input X necessarily results in Output Y.

But real life systems don't often obey these rules; they tend toward chaos and often lead to counterintuitive conclusions. In business, they often create examples of The Law of Unintended Consequences.

The Laffer Curve is a perfect example. To a "Progressive", if you want the government to have more tax revenue, you raise tax rates. Cutting tax rates only benefits "the rich".

But the real world is governed by the chaotic rules of economics and personal choices. Arthur Laffer made the simple observation that if tax rates are zero, tax revenue is zero. If tax rates are 100%, tax revenue is also zero. Somewhere in between is a maximum, and tax rates above that optimum rate actually result in less tax revenue.

Businessmen don't need to have this concept explained, so they tend to be conservatives. Academics, trade unionists and Hollywood types will never get it, so they become "Progressives".

Pretty funny stuff, eh? Of course, the plate tectonics idea is a good example - only it's the Vladimirs of the world who are the left-behind skeptics decrying climate change as kook-ish. As for calling progressives "deterministic" and implying they're simplistic? Bad maneuver using to the Laffer curve as evidence, that over-simplistic and crudely deterministic bow hastily scrawled onto a napkin in a 1974 political meeting and ever since used to support the most simplistic conservative tax-cut rhetoric, that raising taxes invariably leads to lower government revenue, and cutting taxes leads to greater revenue. (Both are canards divorced from the reality of the actual, complex marketplace.)

All this complex thinkin' leads Vladimir to this post: "The Unbearable Complexity of Climate," whose basic premise is that the climate is very complex and we don't understand it completely; therefore, it's possible climate change may not be happening, and, therefore, doesn't need to be addressed. Follow this line of reasoning to its ultimate, late-night-smoking-pot-at-college conclusion, and nothing is worth doing or believing because, ultimately, no system or object is capable of being understood completely. Not climate change, not the existence of your friends, and certainly not the Laffer Curve's efficacy (or lack thereof) for predicting tax revenues.

Why get out of bed in the morning when your alarm goes off, when there's a chance all life on the planet will be obliterated during your morning commute by a wayward asteroid?

If the climate is as all-unknowable as Eschenbach claims, then there's a chance that climate change is happening...right? And do you, in good faith, knowing that there's a chance - what with the unknowable-ness of climate - that climate change will make the Earth uninhabitable for humans, do you in good faith sit by, or worse, actively obstruct any measures that might mitigate the possibility of ecological disaster?

That, of course, is countering the argument with their own brand of sophism. In reality, climate scientists do have more than a passing familiarity of climate science, and there is actual evidence of climate change accompanying varying carbon dioxide rates. And we should probably form policy around the evidence at hand.

But just as Ross Douthat isn't really pleading for more complex movies about war, neither are these folks concerned about shades of gray in scientific discourse. They're all engaging in sophistry to obscure facts that are politically unpalatable to them. A climate change "skeptic" represents a political position, not a scientific one. Such a "skeptic" doesn't question climate change, he rejects it out of hand, and opposes any political solution to reduce carbon emissions. Not because there's a good reason to, but because it happens to stake out a position defined by political allies.

And to what end, is the question? To defend the interests of Big Oil?

Matt Damon vs. the rehabilitation of George W Bush

by: Jay Stevens

Mon Mar 15, 2010 at 17:45:27 PM MST

To anyone who was paying attention in 2003 and after, this is familiar territory. Mr. Greengrass and the screenwriter, Brian Helgeland, deftly glean material from the historical record, and while they compress, simplify and invent according to the imperatives of the genre - this is a thriller, not a documentary - they do so with seriousness and an impressive sense of scruples. They have clearly studied journalistic accounts of the early days of the war, citing Rajiv Chandrasekaran's vivid "Imperial Life in the Emerald City" as a particular inspiration, and while the picture they paint of infighting among the Americans and growing factionalism among the Iraqis may not be literally accurate in every particular, it has the rough authority of novelistic truth.

At the movie's core is the discovery by an Army officer, played by Matt Damon, that the US government's justification for invasion - Iraqi WMDs - was manufactured.

And watching it made me feel outraged all over again. If anything, the movie should be a reminder of how awful, how devastatingly awful the last administration was, how sick the invasion was, how wrong its supporters were - especially after it was evident it was a sham, a setup, a con job.

Naturally the movie is irking conservatives, who are busy trying to resurrect Bush's reputation. Ross Douthat takes a novel approach for a conservative, and pines for someone to depict the "complexities" of the war, instead of turning it into some over-simplistic story of good vs evil.  ("If only Hollywood could be more like George W Bush," writes FDL's Blue Texan, "and embrace a sophisticated, nuanced, shades-of-gray type of worldview - rather than so clumsily dividing the world into good and evil." Or read Daniel Larison's complete smackdown of Douthat.)

Of course, in a way - and not the way Douthat intends - the move is a little over simplistic. For starters, in "The Green Zone," there's much surprise when no WMDs are found and there's shock when it's revealed that the administration had a hand in manufacturing WMD intelligence. Of course, by the invasion, it was pretty clear that there were no WMDs in Iraq, and that the intelligence from the Pentagon was suspect, to say the least.

That is, the move is an over-simplistic flick that augurs how the American public will remember the war, how most are already processing it. Basically, people are remembering that they were hoodwinked, when, in fact, most people had the evidence, heard the dissenting voices, and still supported the war. The public and the media galloped headlong towards Iraq under Bush's banner willingly, despite the plethora of reasonable and well-informed voices that showed there was nothing there...

So, yeah. It p*ssed me off.