Funmurphys: the Blog

An Unforgiving God

Eamon Fitzgerald reflects on the Pope's visit to America :

Yes, of course, many crimes have been committed in the name of God, but no Christian leader was ever as barbaric as Hitler, or Stalin, or Mao, or Pol Pot or Saddam. Those monsters were not constrained by a moral order based on the dominion of a forgiving God. They were God. They were unforgiving.

My Debate With Senator Obama

Barry:

The AP reports Obama "dismissively" talked about the debate yesterday "and the line of questioning from ABC News' moderators, arguing that it focused on political trivia at the expense of the problems facing average voters." At a rally in North Carolina, Obama "drew roars of approval" when he "mocked" the "tough questions" sent his way during the event. ABC World News reports Obama "took issue" with the nature of the debate questions, saying, ""Forty-five minutes before we heard about health care; 45 minutes before we heard about Iraq; 45 minutes before we heard about jobs; 45 minutes before we heard about gas prices."

Kevin:

Birds of a feather flock together

Clinton Agonistes

I have to feel sorry for Hillary Clinton. Only just a teensy bit, though. Here she was inevitable, Obama left for dead before Iowa, and now she's on the brink of losing the nomination. And so she fights back with her "experience" and her "who do you want to answer the phone at 3AM at the Whitehouse" - but left unsaid is that John McCain wins both those battles. If those arguments persuade you, then why not vote for McCain in the general if you vote for Hillary for those reasons in the primary. I have real problems with McCain-Feingold, but at least it's major legislation. What's the legislation with Clinton's or Obama's name on it? John McCain has a huge track record in the Senate - Clinton has some, and Obama has what, if anything? McCain isn't my first choice (Thompson), or my second choice (Romney), but I certainly feel comfortable with him answering the phone at 3AM, and I certainly feel comfortable with his track record of leadership and experience in office.

So when Hillary hammers Saint Barry on his experience and dovishness, all McCain has to do is replace Obama with Clinton and Clinton with McCain and he's set.

Clinton: "Prius Owners Won't Get Mortgage Deduction"

I know I'm just a country bumpkin from Missouri, but when a politician says this:

"In addition, Hillary will end the tax incentives to companies that ship jobs overseas, and invest those resources in creating good, high-paying jobs here in the U.S."

I can't help but think

"In addition, Hillary will end the mortgage income tax deduction to individuals who buy Priuses, because they are shipping those good, high-paying jobs overseas. Instead, they should buy cars manufactured right here in the U.S."

Of course, you'll never hear a politician actually say that, although for the life of me I can't see the difference between a company buying products from overseas and an individual buying products from overseas. Companies are just aggregators of all the people necessary to make a product for the purchasers of the product. Economically or morally, it makes no difference if the purchaser or the company aggregates from foreigners - the foreigners are employed just the same (not that there's anything wrong with that). In fact, from this nativist point of view, isn't better to buy from a company that outsources than from a foreign company because the outsourcer preserves more American jobs?

A Simple Proposal

I have not paid close attention to the Presidential race so far. It's far too early. However, I know the general outlines of what people will complain about - too much money will be spent, the campaign will go on far too long, too many people will be bothered by pollsters and candidates alike, and too many states will bypassed because they "aren't in play". I have a rather simple solution. I propose that in return for a small renumeration from all the other states, but large enough to eliminate our income tax, presidential elections be held in Missouri alone. We are the Bellwether State after all -- Missouri has voted for the winner of every Presidential race in every election of the past century except one (1956). And in the last half-century, not only have we picked the winner, we were amazingly close to the popular vote.

Think of all the advantages - far less money spent, a much shorter election, nobody outside Missouri disturbed by either the candidates or the media, and nobody has to feel like they've been unfairly ignored by the candidates (ignored yes, unfairly, no). All this and the same outcomes! What's not to like about it?

Media Incompetent - Film All The Time

I'm told not only are there a whole bunch of candidates for next year's Presidential election, they are holding debate after debate between them. I see this information in blogs, but never on TV. Apparently, at some of these debates the sponsoring media organization (I don't think calling CNN a news organization is factually accurate) is fooled, like Justin Timberlake, by people claiming to be undecided or average voters. The latest debate was the worst in this regard, as apparently CNN was fooled repeatedly by political operatives pretending to be, well, normal people. As this was somehow tied in with that other politically neutral group, YouTube, and thus the internet, I think CNN stuck in a timewarp in so many ways still believes the (in internet years) old saw that "On the internet, nobody knows you're a dog". How very 1993 of them. If you scroll down at the link, you'll discover the reality - not only can anyone figure out you're a dog on the internet, they know your breed, likes, dislikes, favorite activities, and most importantly in this context, your political affiliations.

This is true for not just dogs, not just people, but media organizations as well.

The Joys Of A Democrat In The White House

In some ways I look forward to a President from the Democratic party. Overnight, the Democrats will be for the war on terror. I know that right now the right is calling the Democrats the Surrendercrats and otherwise calling out the lack of a Democratic backbone, but we shouldn't lose sight of the fact that with a Democrat in the White House the Democratic party doesn't just rattle sabers, it slashes away with great gusto. Bill Clinton had no trouble attacking other countries, and the Democrats didn't say boo. Our attack on Serbia over Kosovo was pre-emptive, our airforce bombed Serbian state television -- killing civilians and members of the press -- because we didn't like what they were broadcasting.

And lest we forget, it was the Clinton administration that invented "extraordinary rendition. It was Peace Prize winner Al Gore who defended the procedure in interal deliberations thusly: ""That's a no-brainer. Of course it's a violation of international law, that's why it's a covert action. The guy is a terrorist. Go grab his ass."

Since the mainstream media isn't just made up of Democrats, but has become a chief supporter of Democrats, the tone of stories will change overnight. Our successes in Iraq will at last be reported; the economy will improve overnight (except for those areas that the Democrats want to change, so healthcare will still be in crisis, and the deficit will be mentioned only in the context of the need to raise taxes). And with the press not feeling the need to smear Bush any way they can, the tone of overall reportage in general will improve, while the stores about how bad the US is will dramatically decline, so much so that our stature in the world will improve (which naturally will be described as result of the policies of our wise and beloved Democratic President). Yes, the stories the US press pushes are picked up internationally; the idea that somehow our press stops at the waters edge and has no influence on how the rest of the world sees us is laughably naive. It's human nature to assume that a country's own press is more accurate than any foreign reportage.

You might think I'm cynical - but I don't. I think I'm quite scientific, since I've seen this happen before.

Government Popularity Continues Slide

Here's a headline you're not likely to see: Bush twice as popular as Congress. Not that that's saying much, although more people think Bush is doing a good job than people think the average newspaper is accurate, which again isn't saying much.

Now I think it's normal for most President's approval to trend downward with time because the art of governing in America is the art of comprimise while most Americans want victory on the issues that are important to them. At the start of a Presidency, the only thing people hold against him are promises not made. Over time, a President is bound to not deliver victory on more and more issues important to particular Americans. It's harder on a President who lost party majorities in Congress and therefore can deliver on very little - although he can still keep his opponents from delivering victories for their supporters.

Since President Bush serves in interesting times, everything is magnified. While the war is clearly a big driver, the President's failure to deliver on Social Security reform and his difference with his base on immigration reform are another two big hits to his approval. A mainstream media that continues to bend the truth to "get Bush" at all times is no help to his approval ratings either.

I think the real question is why is the approval rating of Congress so low, and what does it mean for America?

Al Gore Wins Nobel Peace Prize

As I'm sure you already know, Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize. This is greated as big news in some quarters, or as an affirmation of the correctness of his global warming scare job. Look, if Al Gore really believed in what he's peddling, namely we all have to make significant lifestyle changes to reduce our carbon emissions or we going to face deathly consequences, he'd change his own behavior. But he doesn't - he burns through carbon based energy at a rate far beyond the average American. Maybe Al Gore is entirely correct in his predictions - but I'm not going to believe a man who doesn't practice in the slightest what he preaches.

So what does his victory really represent? Coupled with other recent Nobel Peace prize picks, it is clear that the European leftist elite, not content with rendering their own countries impotent, are trying to influence American politics to their liking. If the Nobel Peace Prize committee wants to reduce the presitge of their own award, have at it boys. If they think that a bunch of Norwegian elists sway my thinking, they are sadly mistaken.

SCHIP

I read in the papers about President Bush's heartless veto of SCHIP -- and that's how it's always described, heartless, like he's taking money from orphans or is going to personally infect these nameless masses of kids with some horrible disease and then sit back and laugh in the White House as they aren't treated because they don't have "access" to health insurance - and I had a couple of thoughts.

First off, I thought after the Democrats raised the minimum wage in this country, nobody was going to be poor anymore. Silly me. Too bad they didn't have a set of bench marks for that feel good but harm some while helping some others kind of non-solution. The way to raise wages isn't by legislative fiat but by helping people to be more productive.

Secondly, where were all these handringers when President Bush was proposing tax cuts for parents? What a novel idea, let parents decide where they want to spend their money for the children, not Washington.

The crazy thing is, the fight is over just how much the program gets expanded, and oh by the way we're already covering kids above "the poverty line".

Before we get caught up in all the partisan back and forth, with deception the rule of the day, or go all gushy because children are involved, let's think. What kind of healthcare system do we want - one with more third party pay, or one with less? And how do we want to pay for programs - with targeted taxes on one group to help another group, or with broad based taxes to help broad swaths of society? Do we want a battle over icons, another meaningless skirmish between two political parties, or do we want to think clearly about public policy? Because in the mangled words of a real political titan, here we go again -- down the path of slogan wars and demonizing not just what we don't understand, but what we don't want to understand.

If Moms Ran the World ...

The flying nun got everybody stirred up the other day by saying:

“May they be seen, may their work be valued and raised, and to especially the mothers who stand with an open heart and wait – wait for their children to come home for from danger, from harm’s way and from war. I’m not finished. I have to finish talking … if the mothers ruled the world there would be no goddamn wars in the first place.”

The left is decrying "censorship" because FOX cut the cussing (and the rest of the statement with it) out.

Personally, this underscores you're on solid PC ground claiming women are superior to men (not just the flying nun, but entire women's studies departments claim this), but you're in trouble if you claim men are superior to women -just ask Larry Summers who was disinvited to speak by the University of California Regents after they were reminded of Dr. Summers remark that it would be worth researching whether the dearth of female professors in the hard sciences was due to innate sex differences. How is this different than saying mothers are more innately fit to run the world than fathers? Just asking.

I also have to wonder at the condition, if moms ran the world.

Umm, don't they already?

Saint Ignatius of Loyola (founder of the Jesuits) famously observed "Give me the child until he is seven and I will show you the man". I not so famously have observed that women in general, and mom's in particular, have the children -- boys and girls -- to at least seven. I'd pay money to see a discussion between Mr. Jason Whitlock and Mrs. Sally Field on this subject do we have insufficient fathering in this country?

At the risk of raising ire from the right people, I'll also point out that "momma's boy" is not a compliment.

So my answer to the question What would life be like if moms ran the world, I have to say not much different. Actually, I take that back. If we mean only moms ran the world in a dictatorial fashion, then there would be more emphasis on reducing risk across the board - physically, economically, etc. And there would be more emphasis on religion. And we'd all wear clean underwear under penalty of law. I say this because these are two areas where men and women are different - women are more risk averse and more religious, and everybody knows about moms and clean underwear.

But an end to war altogether? No.

Ann Coulter Interview

I'm not a fan of Ann Coulter's an insult too far style of attention getting, but I did find this interview funny:

FB: Sexual harassment is a big issue in certain industries such as politics and the modeling business. Do you think people who trade sexual favors really get ahead?
AC: It seems to have worked for Hillary.

FB: You are a brilliant self made and accomplished woman. Would you ever date a model?
AC: Is the model a Republican?

FB: Which is the Bigger Disaster... a) Britney Spears at the VMAs... b) The New York Times.
AC: At least there's hope for Britney.

The comments would be even more funny if they weren't such a sad commentary on the current state of political discourse.

Craig, Gore, and Begley: Hypocrisy Examined

I think charges of hypocrisy are thrown around far more than warrented. The most common case is where someone who advocates what we shall call virtue is found not to always act in accordance with that virtue. For me the person would be a hypocrite not just because they sometimes failed to live up to their standards (only the standardless person would not then be a hypocrite), but the person who advocates something as a virtue they really don't think is a virtue and who have no intention of living up to it as a standard.

So do I think for example that Senator Craig is a hypocrite as some have suggested for being a closeted conservative homosexual while not supporting a liberal homosexual agenda? No, I don't think so. I think he should resign for soliciting sex in a public restroom, but I don't think he's a hypocrite because his politics don't match someone else's idea of what they should be because of his sexual orientation.

I think Al Gore is a hypocrite because while he tells us that because CO2 emissions are going to wreck the planet and kill millions, we need to change our lifestyles to reduce carbon emissions, he has not made any such changes in his lifestyle (nor is he alone in this).

Which brings me to Ed Begley Jr. I've seen his show on HGTV a couple of times (it's on after Design Star) and he's the anti-Gore. While I'm a global warming sceptic, I appreciate that making changes in the atmosphere's chemistry may not be a good idea without a much better understanding than we possess. Begley seems to live the lifestyle he advocates, and he makes a fear free pitch. He doesn't say you need to change everything or we're all going to die; instead he tries to give practical advice on how you can save energy (and money) in a pretty non-judgemental way:

I think there will be a lot of takeaways; that’s the thing that we’re going to try and stress, that people should grab the low-hanging fruit first. Not everybody is going to buy a hybrid car, an electric car, put up solar panels, or maybe even do solar hot water — that may be out of people’s budgets — even though it’s a lot less than solar electric. But people can afford a light bulb. They can afford a thermostat if it’s going to put them into profit in six months. They can afford perhaps some insulation, if they have a little piece of dirt in their backyard or front yard, they can plant some vegetables, they can afford to compost, or ride a bike or take a bus. Those things are quite affordable; indeed they’re quite cost-effective.

Who gets better press coverage - Al Gore, or Ed Begley Jr. Who should? I'll take Ed any day of the week.

Who Keeps Returning the Bums to Office?

David Bernstein asks a good question, Why should Larry Craig Resign? While he makes a good point, namely that other Senators have done far worse regarding their legislative duties -- a critique I'm pretty much in full agreement with -- one has to ask whey don't the other Senators resign, and I have to wonder why incumbents are such heavy favorites for reelection given how badly so many of them perform. Why don't we ever turn the bums out, and will the current catasprophically low approval ratings of Congress lead to fewer reelected bums?

Universal Healthcare for Soldiers

I'm shocked, shocked to discover that politicians brazenly lie. Or that it would be Claire McCaskill this time.

Have you ever noticed how when it's a Democrat in the White House, the credit for good news goes to his administration and blame for bad news goes to "the government", but when a Republican is in the White House, just the opposite occurs?

Pelosi and the Plane

I think Speaker Pelosi is being unfairly attacked over "Air Pelosi". Just because I disagree with many of her political positions, that doesn't give me the right to distort her positions or otherwise treat her unfairly. As Speaker of the House she's supposed to get the use of an airplane - just like Dennis Hastert did. Maybe I'm just a fool, but I don't believe the claims she demanded something bigger and better than what Hastert got - they play to the political dislike of her. I'm friends with many people who have political positions that I disagree with (some even to the right of me), and I'm no less their friend because of it. Why do we treat people who we have different political positions differently than those we do agree with? Why are we willing to believe the worst of those who have different politics?

And even if the worst were true - if Speaker Pelosi did demand Air Force 3 - the biggest jet after AF1 & 2 to ferry around her and her pals, would that somehow invalidate her political positions? Would the military campaign in Iraq be justified by that? Would hiking the minimum wage now be discredited? Universal Healthcare run and funded by the Federal government would have been just the ticket except Nancy Pelosi demanded an overlarge plane to fly around in? Of course not.

The United States has enough real enemies that we don't need to treat each other like enemies.

Republican Hopeful Thumbnails

McCain: I don't like him, I hate McCain-Feingold, no.

Romney: Who?

Giuliani: I like him, clearly a good executive, the only thing he can do about abortion and gun control as president is appoint good judges, yes.

Kerry Snubs Troops

In the lastest example of a Seinfeld scandal (the length of a Seinfeld scandal is directly proportional to the strength of its vacuum, which is why 3 years later the saga of the plastic turkey continues) it's official - John Kerry wasn't snubbed by soldiers in Iraq, he snubbed them. For a pair of reporters.

Let's give three cheers (or if Brother Byrd is reading, two Hallelujahs and an Amen) for the political acumen of John 'Malpractice' Kerry. Maybe somebody should give his staff T-shirts that read "Kerry went all the way to Iraq for a photo op with the troops and all he did was talk to a lousy pair of reporters".

You've got to know you're base. If you're John Kerry, who's more important, a whole bunch of ignoramuses who blew their schooling and wound up in Iraq, or a couple of reporters for the New York Times? Kind of a no-brainer, isn't it?

Bryan Preston actually apologizes for calling Kerry "lonely" - which rates two Hallelujahs! and and an Amen! for Brother Preston from this corner at any rate. Although I will note that since loneliness is an emotional state it can't be determined from a photograph - you can be lonely sitting at a table full of people (remember the start of Freshman year anyone?) and whatever the opposite of lonely is sitting all by yourself.

Flap apologizes an a more Kerryesque style.

Just to get out ahead on big John, here's the next Kerry scandal of Sienfelding proportions.

I'm Bob Dole

I'm a 35, which puts me right under the picture of Bob Dole at this quiz. Funny, I picked that we shut cut farm subsidies, something I don't think Bob "Kansas" Dole ever advocated. Maybe we both have good senses of humor. I'm not a fan of the single axis political interpretation, and a bunch of the questions were pretty much toss ups for me (e.g. which do you distrust more, IRS or FBI). While fun, I don't think that reducing my politics to a number is useful, unlike my credit score. If it were, I suppose I could just put up a daily post consisting entirely of "35".

via Ed Driscoll

Meet The New Boss, Same As The Old Boss

Will there be less corruption or more corruption now that the Democrats have taken Congress? While you might find it hard to image that it would be more, Don Surber looks at the incoming congress and concludes that based just on those we know already are crooks, it will be more. I suppose I can't complain since I knowingly voted for a convicted felon in the past.

Election Day Plus 1

This was an election where neither party deserved a win (IMHO, at least) but the electorate decided in the aggregate to throw the bums out and give the other bums a chance. The Republicans ran the way they governed -- not well. I can't recall any mention about the economy and how it's booming. The Democrats weren't much better, but they were better enough to win back the House and maybe even the Senate. It's my hope this doesn't spark a Republican search for purity but learning, as in learning from their mistakes.

I went to bed with Jim Talent winning and Amendment 2 losing, and awoke to find Talent lost and Amendment 2 won. While Amendment 2 won't actually change anything, Talent's loss will.

The minimum wage increase passed handily. We can all feel good about ourselves now. Too bad for the people priced out of the job market by this (maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon.) Yeah, I know the supporters got people with big pointy heads to say this wouldn't affect employment, but can you name any commodity that when you raise the price on it people buy more of it?

What I don't understand is how slow the election returns came in for Missouri. This year voting was either touch screen or opti-scan, both of which log the votes immediately. We should have results seconds after the polls close. Instead, as I write this, there are 68 precincts still not reporting. Did the horse and buggy breakdown?

I feel virtuous today - I voted against a tax on other people (Amendment 3) and voted for 2 taxes on myself - one for the Parkway school district, and one for the Special school district. I would have voted for the tobacco tax (Amendment 3) if the backers had just been honest. I might not be alone in that (hint, hint).

Poll workers must have gotten a commision on touch screen voters because they were really pushing it hard. Glenn Reynolds would be so proud of me -- I voted using the new pen and paper method - the same one I took standardized tests in school with 30 years ago. I did so only because the line was so much shorter for the optiscan than the touch screen.

No word on whether Red Villa voted in this election.

I expect "Mission Accomplished" banners to be hung up in newsrooms across the country. No word if the newsrooms can put 2 and 2 together.

In similar news, Nicaraguans have returned Daniel Ortega to power. The tagline of this blog, The Triumph of Hope Over Experience was certainly in evidence yesterday.

You End Up Getting Your Foot Stuck In Your Mouth

I'm willing to accept that John Kerry was not trying to criticism American soldiers as stupid but mistakenly called them unmotivated, lazy, and ignorant. So I agree with Ms. Barber that Mr. Kerry is being unfairly attacked on this subject:

“I can’t overstress the importance of a great education. Do you know where you end up if you don’t study, if you aren’t smart, if you’re intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq.”

That’s a clear reference to Bush, who Kerry implies is dumb. But it came out like this:

“You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq.”

It's bad enough that he's being condescending. John Kerry is where he is today not through diligent application in school, but by being willing to do anything to advance himself no matter what.

But far worse is that he's trying to turn a policy disagreement into a stupid joke. Literally. Great, that's who I want trying to determine national policy. I guess that means Kerry's idol, JFK, is a dumb fratboy like Bush because he got stuck in Vietnam - the original "quagmire".

Not every politician can tell a joke, and it really isn't a senatorial requirement, but I don't think that let's JoKe off the hook. Besides, calling them stupid woudn't have been near as bad as things he's actually called them - war criminals.

What are the things Democrats complain about Bush?

That he's a poor public speaker? Guess what, this latest from Kerry only shows that Kerry's worse.

That he doesn't admit mistakes? Has Kerry admitted his mistake and apologized? Ha, he's gone the blame everybody else route. [And now belatedly apologized.]

That he's dumb? Hey, Kerry got worse grades in school. And he flubbed an easy joke.

Look, I find that Kerry is everything that the Democrats today complain about Bush (including the liar part) only moreso, yet not only can they stomach Kerry, they made him their Presidential candidate in 2004. The Democrats could have been a contender - they could have put the standard in Joe Lieberman's capable hands in 2004 but instead that went with a pathetic loser like Kerry and kicked Lieberman out of the party.

Political Strategist Straw Poll

I'm holding a referendum on Tom Maguire:

Is Tom Maguire

[ ] Not Smart Enough to be a strategist for the Democrats, or

[ ] Too Smart to be a strategist for the Democrats.

I don't want to bias the results by proclaiming my opinion, but let me just say that if Tom were to become a strategist for the Democrats the age of signs and wonders would clearly be upon us.

Of course he's too smart to be a strategist for the Democrats; he's too smart to be a strategist for the Republicans too. I could become President if Tom became my brain like a certain other, better known team (that actually is a team).

Romney Sets A Reporter Straight

I want to have Mitt Romney's baby:

That has to be the best smooth rebuke I've seen.

Via Powerline.

I Have A Dream

Here's a Democratic platform I can get behind. Too bad it's only satire, although I don't doubt that Scott Ott also wishes it wasn't. Could a Democrat today say with a straight face:

"Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans, born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage, and unwilling to permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.

"Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe to assure the survival and success of liberty."

Other than Joe Lieberman, that is?

Lost In Translation

Here's my problem, when I hear the phrase "common good" I think "tragedy of the commons".

Perhaps my problem is that I've found I like economics outside the academic setting, where I found it boring and repulsive.

Faster Feiler Meets Confirming Best

A couple of years ago my Adult Bible Fellowship teacher (Ken Best) mentioned that people are wired such that the feedback they get from life tends to reinforce (or confirm) their prior opinions, and that's because how we process information depends on what we think it will tell us. I have to say I agree with this observation. Generally, it takes something big (e.g. 9/11) to cause such a disconnect that we actually reexamine our prior opinion, but normally we see what we expect to see and disregard the rest.

Mickey Kaus has championed the Faster Feiler Thesis, which essentially is that we have speeded up both the information flow and its processing for people. And I have to say I also agree with this.

Put the two together, and what do you get - increased polarization. Our opinion is converted from jello to cement in ever faster times. And if there are two sides to every argument, then we have two sides set like epoxy around every policy, every politician, around pretty much everything (those Taste Great/Less Filling ads aren't so funny now). Not only do we process the increased information flow faster, the increased flow drives us to become set in our positions ever faster.

Sound like real life? Perhaps how Bush Derangement Syndrome can become both widespread and hard to cure so quickly? Perhaps why so many people seem to be so completely convinced that they are not just right, but so right that any disagreement can only spring from impure motives -- or you're not just wrong, you're evil.

Who Wants To Be A Politician

Commenting on the latest media gotcha of a politician, my wife asked why would anyone go into politics these days. Why indeed.

One On One With Kim Jong-Il

Yes, this is going around so you can find it all over, and yes, it really is unfair to Madeleine Albright, but after She Who Must Be Obeyed opened her mouth, I couldn't resist.

A less funny, more traditional rebuttal was provided by Sen. John McCain. McQ delivers a fisking. Personally, I can't fault either administration too much because North Korea under Kim Jong-il was simply going to try and develop nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them no matter what anyone said. It was worth giving talk a chance, but once it becomes clear that's a waste of time, why continue? Now we need to talk to the North Korea's neighbors about what we are going to do, not talk to Kim.

And another thing, why is it the same people who criticize President Bush for acting unilaterally, or for the US acting like a bully, demand that the talks with North Korea only be with the United States? It's just more dead horse beating.K

Representatives Foley, Hastert, and Shimkus

I'm just glad that Mark Foley wasn't a Boy Scout Leader. Everything else about the sordid situation is just bad. And I have to agree with Dick Durban, someone I disagree with on about everything else, and that is:

Durbin also said the House Page Board should be abolished. Durbin said there are no senators involved in overseeing the Senate page program, and instead it is run by nonpartisan staff.

"The Page Board in the House should go," Durbin said. "It is clearly too political."

I don't want my representatives running the page program - it detracts from their time they should be spending legislating, they aren't going to be as good at as professionals, and even if it isn't political in itself, clearly it can become so at a time like this.

Hastert and Shimkus can stay, but the page board has to go.

Full Disclosure: My nephew was an intern with Rep. Shimkus several years ago -- and yes, his respect for Shimkus does color my thinking on this one.

Republicans and Me

I admit I was wrong. I thought that the theory that American system would create two parties that would be forced to the center in order to remain competative. This hasn't happened lately, as the two parties seem to be engaged not in a race to the center but to the poles, or in the case of the Republicans, never never land. I understand that the Democrats have moved to the left to satisfy the vocal minority out there, but I'm not entirely sure where the Republicans are going.

I don't consider myself a Republican for the reason I plump for principle over party. So while the Republican party has been the vehicle for conservatism, my loyalty is to conservatism, not Republicans. I'm both a social conservative and a fiscal conservative, so I'm prime Republican material.

My problem with the party these days is pretty much on the fiscal side, and I want to make something clear to Republican politicians - since you have (far) more control over the government than the culture, I judge you by the government under your control, and specifically for Congress the budgets under your control and the laws you pass.

For example, I'm against abortion for any reason besides saving the life of the mother, but I understand that (1) the laws on abortion has been taken over by the courts since 1973, (2) the attitudes toward abortion are not controlled by politicians. So guess what, as long as you do a good job on judges, you're off the hook. I realize how little you can accomplish, so I can't hold you accountable.

One last thing. While much is made about a revolt or dissidents in the party over interrogation techniques, I have to say finally. This is what the branches of government should be doing, and I have to wonder, where are the Democrats? At last we have a real discussion over issues, and the Democrats are nowhere to be found. So why vote Democratic if all they can do is partisan sniping?

Nobel Peace Prize?

What is the one thing a leftist thinks violence solves?

Better Government

I think we need two good, strong parties to make our government work. Otherwise, you get what we have now, which isn't pretty. So I don't want to see a purer Democratic or Republican party, which is what party partisans are always calling for - I'd like to see two sane, responsible big tent parties vie for votes while taking a long term view of the election process. Instead, what we have is one party taking advantage of the fact that the other has become, well, deranged. And the fact that the national media has joined the one party in its madness and is doing it's best to distort reality doesn't help - which is how you get a majority of people supporting private Social Security accounts but a majority dissaproving President Bushes plan on Social Security, which consisted of a nebulous plan for private accounts.

Border Crossings Reduced

Hmm, apparently sending the National Guard to help seal the border has already had an effect: fewer illegal immigrants are trying to cross, in a mixture of individual discouragement and higher smuggler fees. Let's hope Congress does its part so that they don't waste the time and effort of thousands of National Guardsmen.

Third Party Thoughts

The talk of the day is about a third political party. Oddly enough, it seems to be driven by disaffected Republicans hoping for a purer or better Republican party. Parties are odd things - since to be one of the two major parties you have to be pretty inclusive. What actually defines them? The Democrats think of themselves as the party of the little guy and the Republicans think of themselves as the party of mainstreet America, but are they really? And even when you say the Democrats are the party of urban and rural America while the Republicans are the party of Suburbia, that is a tendency, not a uniformity. Same thing goes for the whole Red/Blue state dichotomy - we're really just shifting pattern of purple.

I would have thought the Democratic coalition of disparate groups would be the first to crack because the members seem to be in actual opposition over positions, where the Republican coalition between fiscal conservatives and moral conservatives could better tolerate different areas of interest. For instance, the working class Catholic part of the Democratic coalition has to clash with both the anti-religous and pro-abortion wings of the coalition. The interests of Black parents and the teacher's union leadership are also in opposition. The amazing thing to me about the Democratic party is that it hasn't torn itself apart, but maybe the ability to unite around hating Republican presidents is enough of a glue to keep itself together. And perhaps that's why the Republicans do better at electing Presidents - the strain shows up the worst on a national scale.

Of course, what people when they talk about a new third party is a third major party, because there are more third parties already out there than you can shake a stick at. In my life we've had a couple of third party candidates -- John Anderson (who's policies for 1980 are amazingly relevant for today) and Ross Perot who might have actually won the election if he hadn't vacillated because of what he thought was a Republican dirty tricks campaign -- but they didn't leave a major third party behind.

The last third party to emerge was the Republicans themselves - and it wasn't driven by leadership but by principle - the fight over slavery. That sort of galvanizing principle is what's needed to form a new major party, not some isolated man on a white horse riding in to our rescue. And the party that fell apart during the relignment was the Whigs, kind of old school Libertarians, who weren't as old, organized, or successful as the Democrats. I'm not sure that a new party built along the lines of what commentators think the Republican party should be would actually spawn a brand new third party when it's more likely that it would simply reenergize and transform the existing Republican party. If the problem is that the party faithful feel their party leadership is out of touch, wouldn't it be more likely that a lot of incumbants lose primaries and a new party leadership be installed than a whole new party be formed?

For a new major party to form, you have to have significant numbers of voters leave both current major parties, so you have to have a principle that divides both parties. Otherwise you wind up with one major party, two minor parties, and that same host of insignificant parties. Is (more/less) immigration that principle? It sure seems to provoke enough emotional reaction; but I'm not clear that it would split both parties or that a third party could grow by planting that banner. The fight over slavery festered and blazed over decades before it forged a new party - I don't think we are there yet on immigration. I don't think it's enough for people to climb up out of their ruts.

Quite frankly, I see the Democrats in far more danger of an actual crack up than the Republicans. I don't want to underestimate the power of habit and hatred, but that is all I can see holding the Democrats together. And a crack up of either party would mean a realignment as different interest groups migrated between the parties. If one or the other were to break apart, the other one would be changed as well as an influx of new voters and an outflow of old voters would change the party whatever it's name is.

Communism Is Alive And Well

Tim at Random Observations has a look at the reality behind communist infiltration in the US:

Today, Haynes has come full circle. Years ago he laughed at the old Minnesota DFLers. Now, many of his fellow historians dismiss him.

"They still see Communist Party USA members as idealists focused on social justice -- just 'liberals in a really big hurry,' " he says. But Haynes is hopeful that the facts will prevail. Younger historians are more receptive, he says. "They don't have the same investment in the academic conventional wisdom as the Sixties generation, who often try to rewrite history to suit their own agenda."

What more needs to be said? When it's so abudantly clear from history that Marxism is a philosphy of death and destruction, why are there any Marxists left, and why are there so many teaching at Universities?

Bad Government, or Praise for Bureaucracy

Oddly enough, both meanings of "bad" work when applied to government - bad in the sense of immoral and in the sense of poorly run. When I look around, I see a lot of bad government - it's bad government that is the root cause of most of the problems worldwide. Bad government leads to the famine, chaos, and war in Africa; leads to the horrible suffering of North Koreans and Cubans (among sadly too many others), and leads to the instability and turmoil in South America.

But we're seeing good government in action in Washington. No, not the clueless band of politicians that currently inhabit Congress; but the continuing demonstration that we are a nation ruled by laws, not men. Yes, problems are looming like Medicare and Social Security, we are fighting a war with a nation divided, members of Congress are behaving not just irresponsibly, but criminally -- yet the economy is booming, people from the world over are trying to live here, life is good in general because governement doesn't "run" the nation, and the government itself continues to function well enough because it isn't "run" by the politicians. Come what may, we have confidence in our government to function adequately.

The Showdown That Wasn't

Remember when President Bush nominated Gen Hayden to be head of the CIA, replacing the resigning Porter Goss? We were told how Congress was sharpening their knives over this one, with even Republicans questioning the nomination. Senator Arlen Spector claimed he would use the hearings to delve into the NSA's programs for eavesdropping and collecting call information. Well, the whole intellegence committee got a full briefing, and a funny thing happened on the way to the big showdown -- he was voted out of committee 12-3, and he was confirmed by the full senate 78-15. Some showdown. And it points up once again, the more you know about the NSA programs, the more in favor of it you are.

Dennis "Haymaker" Hastert

The Congressional Search kerfufle has taken a couple of new twists: First, President Bush ordered the material seized to be sealed for 45 days. For some reason, this sparked wonderment in some quarters, although not in others. I'm firmly in the camp that this makes sense, for a couple of reasons: one is that the President has to work with Congress, so it doesn't make sense to get into a public shouting match with the leadership he wants to work with over something that really is the pervue of low level government (IOW the President and Congress really shouldn't get involved in a routine police matter). The other is that this allows the President to have a series quiet, private chats with the House leadership that has gone bonkers and allow the whole matter to drift off to oblivion, with the announcement of the resolution time to coincide with something of far more interest to the news media, like another disappearence of an attractive young white woman. And really the President is giving anything up - he made it clear that the evidence would not be returned, and a 45 day delay in a case like this is nothing - the FBI already waited 8 months to seize the material after serving a subpeona.

Another bizare twist is that Hastert has fired a shot across ABCs bow for their repeated claims that he's somehow under investigation (or in their odd phrase, "in the mix" - I never knew investigating Congress was like baking a cake) after the Justice Department has officially stated he isn't. ABC has revealed enought for it to be clear that in fact there is nothing new here. Will the obvious questions this raises be persued? Hell no. We won't go asking about the propriety of an investigator or investigators making these leaks (short answer is that whoever leaked it should be investitgated and fired), nor will we be asking why this leak, now? Speaker Hastert obviously feels that it is retaliation for his complaint over the search of William Jefferson's Congressional Office. Is there another motive? I just hope Denny shows as much fire and tenacity in going after ABC, which they so richly deserve, as he as in going after the FBI over the search (which they don't deserve).

And what's getting lost in all the subsequent plot twists? That all the evidence points to William Jefferson being a crook.

Guess The Neo-Con

Synchronicity happens. I'm reading a blog post with a quote from a well known person, and then I read an article and bam, you have a Reece's Peanut Butter Cups. Some writer for the Washington Post writes another attack on Neo-cons, which has become short hand for someone a lefty doesn't like (being Jewish doesn't hurt), and so I respond. See if you can guess the well known author of the following quotes.

For I have sworn before you and Almighty God the same solemn oath our forebears prescribed nearly a century and three-quarters ago. The world is very different now. For man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life. And yet the same revolutionary beliefs for which our forebears fought are still at issue around the globe -- the belief that the rights of man come not from the generosity of the state, but from the hand of God.

Sure sounds like a neo-con, nattering on about God and the rights of man.

In short, it is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high today and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now. The experience of a number of European countries and Japan have borne this out. This country's own experience with tax reduction in 1954 has borne this out. And the reason is that only full employment can balance the budget, and tax reduction can pave the way to that employment. The purpose of cutting taxes now is not to incur a budget deficit, but to achieve the more prosperous, expanding economy which can bring a budget surplus.

Sheesh, he's a supply sider too. Doesn't he know this is trickle down, voodoo economics, the kind that didn't work for Ronald Reagan or GW Bush?

Freedom is indivisible, and when one man is enslaved, all are not free.

Typical neo-con going on about freedom but not the important stuff like universal healthcare. No doubt he wants the US to go stick its nose in other people's business and force them to be like America.

The 1930's taught us a clear lesson: aggressive conduct, if allowed to go unchecked and unchallenged, ultimately leads to war. This nation is opposed to war.

Can't neo-cons get over WWII? That isn't the only war you know. What about the lessons of Vietnam?

My fellow citizens, let no one doubt that this is a difficult and dangerous effort on which we have set out. No one can foresee precisely what course it will take or what costs or casualties will be incurred. Many months of sacrifice and self-discipline lie ahead -- months in which both our patience and our will will be tested, months in which many threats and denunciations will keep us aware of our dangers. But the greatest danger of all would be to do nothing.

The path we have chosen for the present is full of hazards, as all paths are; but it is the one most consistent with our character and courage as a nation and our commitments around the world. The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender or submission.

Our goal is not the victory of might, but the vindication of right; not peace at the expense of freedom, but both peace and freedom, here in this hemisphere, and, we hope, around the world. God willing, that goal will be achieved.

There he goes again, dragging God into it. And what's this guy going on and on about the difficulties for -- where's the exit strategy, where's the clear communication of a plan for total victory? All I hear is somebody who's in over his head, and doesn't know how to get out.

We dare not forget today that we are the heirs of that first revolution. Let the word go forth from this time and place, to friend and foe alike, that the torch has been passed to a new generation of Americans -- born in this century, tempered by war, disciplined by a hard and bitter peace, proud of our ancient heritage, and unwilling to witness or permit the slow undoing of those human rights to which this nation has always been committed, and to which we are committed today at home and around the world.

Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, to assure the survival and the success of liberty.

This much we pledge -- and more.

To those old allies whose cultural and spiritual origins we share, we pledge the loyalty of faithful friends. United there is little we cannot do in a host of cooperative ventures. Divided there is little we can do -- for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder.

More of that imperialist talk about not permitting other countries not being up to our standards. And what's this talk about divided there is little we can do -- sounds like he doesn't value dissent. Although, something sounds familiar - haven't I heard that pay any price, bear any burden talk before? Hmm, I don't recall Wolfie or Perle saying that stuff.

Yep, that neo-con I've quoted here is none other than John Fitzgerald Kennedy -- JFK. Gosh, who knew that he was the father of neo-conservatism foreign policy, not Irving Kristol?

Not only is the tone strikingly like the neo-conservative of today (lending credence to their claim that they didn't leave the Democrats, but the Democrats left them) but a shocker is the committment to do hard things. Today the left is consumed with always taking the easy way on foreign policy. Don't rock the boat. Stability is a greater good than liberty for all.

In place of "support any friend, oppose any foe" we have apply pressure to our friends' butts, apply lips to our enemies' butts.

Bear any burden is replaced with the only fruit worth picking is the low hanging variety.

This is the rhetoric of Democrats and the left before Vietnam. They sound quite different today -- still suffering from a culture of defeatism over 30 years later.

I read the quote on economics at Steve Verdon's and was intrigued enough to follow the link to American Rhetoric where I found a bunch of JFK speeches. Reading them, I'm struck by how much the idealism in them is the same as in GWB (and the famous neo-con movement). Now of course I got to pick the excerpts I wanted, but I don't think I distorted JFKs views. And I'm not arguing that if JFK were alive today he would be considered a neo-con because I have no idea what the intervening 40 years would have done to his thinking; but the JFK who was President was far more like Reagan or GW Bush than any current Democrat (except possibly Lieberman).

William Jefferson and Denny Hastert

Politicians serve as a constant source of total amazement for me, even more than the blaze of stars in the sky at night away from city lights which leaves me slackjawed in astonishment. William Jefferson is a member of the House of Represenatives who looks to have taken bribes and is under investigation by the FBI. As part of that investigation, the FBI searched with a warrant Jefferson's congressional office and the US residence of the Vice-President of Nigeria. Oddly enough, it was the search of the congressional office, not the foriegn official's residence, that has raised a stink. Of all the hills to pick to die on, why the Republican leadership in Congress picked this one is beyond me, what with Denny Hastert demanding the FBI turn over any documents it seized as part of the raid, along with the comment "They took the wrong path."

I suppose I should be happy that the Republican congressional leadership is not playing politics, because clearly the political response would be to help carry the boxes the FBI seized and make a statement to the press with boxes in hand that it's a darn shame the Democrats tolerate a criminal in their midst. Instead they make a boneheaded claim that Congressional offices should be sanctuaries for illegal activity. Most people are going to wonder what's in your office, Denny. If a sitting President has to testify before a grand jury, then a Congressional office can be searched by the FBI.

Look, I understand the idea behind the separation of powers, so my question is what would be the correct path here? Congress has passed the laws which the executive branch is trying to enforce, and the FBI executed a search warrant duly authorized by a judge - in other words, the branches of government are doing their separate jobs. The FBI subpeoned the documents it searched for in September of last year, which subpeona Congressman Jefferson and Congress itself ignored alike. And in that eight month period, has Congress opened its own investigation into Congressmen Jefferson, or taken any action at all? Of course not. Back when they had a chance to act, they did nothing. Now they are up hopping on their hind legs bellowing about principle. But what's clear here is that the executive branch isn't trying to intimidate or influence the legislative branch -- a case which would warrant all the bellowing and in which case I would gladly bellow right along -- but a case where the executive branch and judicial branches are going about their constitutional and legislatively mandated roles of law enforcement.

I don't like the FBI raiding congressional offices, but then I like criminals even less and think they should be investigated, prosecuted, and incarcerated whether the criminal is a member of Congress or not -- especially if the criminal is a member of Congress.

Cutting Off Your Nose To Spite Your Face

I keep hearing talk by conservative bloggers about sitting out the 2006 elections to punish the GOP. Does the GOP deserve punishment? Boy, and how. But who exactly would we be punishing, and who would we be rewarding? Do you think Bush is bad on immigration for not being strict enough, why would you let the Democrats, who are far less strict, take over? If you think the Republicans are spending too much, why would you let the Democrats, who would both spend more and tax more, take over? If you don't care for Frist and Hastert, why do you think Reid and Pelosi would be an improvement. Yes, I would like to cast my vote for somebody, but believe me, if I need to I will cast it against somebody.

As far as punishment goes, you'll be punishing the whole nation, and yourselves especially. Yes, some congresspeople would be out of a job, for about half a nano-second until they joined K-Street and made real money for a change.

And what makes you think the message would be that the GOP needs to be more conservative? The Democrats could win in a walk if they moved to the center, but they have chosen (so far) to move to the left. Why do you think the GOP will be any better at reading the tea leaves after the fact then before the fact?

It's Official: Tony Snow

I didn't really expect Don Rumsfeld to be named White House press secretary, so I'm not disappointed that it was the loudly rumored Tony Snow who will be press secretary. Tony is bucking the trend - usually you work for a politician, then you go to work for the press (Stephanopolis, Mathews, Russert, and Scarborough (OK, he was a politician) come quickly to mind). Of course, Tony has already worked for a politician, and I can think of no more thankless job than working as a press secretary for a President's last three years whom the press hate. It's like being put in a cage with starving ferets for three years, and you're the only food in the cage with them. Will the press go easy on him because 1. he was a colleague and 2. he's got cancer? My money is on NOT in a big way because he worked for FOX and his illness is nothing next to the fact he's working for BUSH! Nope, it will 3 years of daily "Get him, kill the heretic!" for Tony.

Immigration: Mexico

Immigration has moved to the front burner in this country. Thoughtful people are writing thoughtfully - Jane Galt has a trio (is that a theme today?) of such posts:
Some rambling thoughts on immigration,
Unwanted guests?
More on immigration.

What I haven't seen is what is driving the issue today - it's really about Mexican immigrants and the large influx of illegal immigrants over our border with Mexico. Absent that large flow over a large border, we wouldn't be having this discussion. I guess nobody wants to sound like a racist, but what grabs people's attention isn't how many technically savvy people come in on HB-1 visas from Asia and India, but how many poor Mexicans are willing to risk death to live in the United States.

The stakes are high all around on this issue - for both Mexico and the United States. We really want to get the answer right -- and that does include all aspects of immigration, including how many HB-1 visas are issued.

And let's face it, its better to be poor in the United States than it is in Mexico. I can't say as I blame people who are trying to make a better life for themselves. But we need to balance everybodies interests, and not focus too exclusively on one particular group.

We need to take a dispassionate look at what we want the end state to be, and then figure out how to get there. I'd start with a Mexico that poor people aren't willing to risk death to leave. So our ultimate goal is a Mexico that has the political and economic institutions that are able to take care of all its citizens. Of course, we have to (1) survive in the meantime, while (2) we help Mexico get there. So that means that while we look at the range of options on how the US deals with immigration, we need to always be looking at the effect that these measures have on Mexico (and really all the countries that have people who want to get out). For instance, building a wall along the entire border - what are the effects on immigration, the effects on the US, the effects on Mexico - all these things need to be considered, not just one.

Gerrymandering

Or how I learned to stop worrying and love the gerrymander.

Gerrymandering is universally unpopular with voters and popular with politicians. And Stuart Taylor puts the case against gerrymandering quite well:

"The one-person, one-vote decisions of the early 1960s have had the unintended consequence of enabling politicians to choose their voters rather than the other way around".

I don't know which is worse, when one party gerrymanders at the expense of the other, or when incumbents of both parties combine to gerrymander at the expense of challengers of the other party.

One of the complaints is that as we have more and more safe districts, we have highly polarized politics. But what about the other extreme? If we drew districts to maximize competitiveness, would we be happy if a party that had 48% of the electorate managed to win 100% of the seats -- which might happen in a smaller state with every district highly competitive. Would politics become focused even more on appearance, on sound bit, on the immediate tactical advantage on election day to the exclusion of good governance? So is the choice between polarized politics or representation that isn't representative?

The other alternative is to take gerrymandering to the other limit, so that districts would be all equally safe which would mean that the representation in the legislature would most closely reflect the party makeup of the electorate. That would achieve the global result of accurate representation of the electorate, but people would feel even less connected to the political process. Heck, we could avoid all the expense and controversy associated with general elections and just hold primaries.

And if you think that most people vote for the person and not the party (you of course never do that, free thinker that you are), then gerrymandering wouldn't work. What makes gerrymandering break down isn't our rugged individualism, but that over time we move around and thus change the relationship between party and location, and that there are slow shifts in the electorate between the parties.

I don't buy the theory that safer districts have led to more political strife. I think what we are seeing is a return to normal (although unpleasant) levels of political strife and incivility that after an abnormal period of consensus that was due to the experiences and outlook of my fathers generation - the one's who grew up during the depression, fought WWII, and came home with the ability and desire to get along to get things done -- and this change happens to correlate with more effective gerrymandering.

We could just select districts based on compactness and carve them up by computer without regard to their competitiveness, but then who knows what you'll get -- which is why politicians will never agree to such an approach. Would we be happy if such a scheme meant the dilution of minority votes, or inadvertantly made uncompetative districts that didn't represent the relative strengths of the parties? Would we then have to step in with some sort of neutral commision to adjust the boundaries so that the districts conformed to notions of fairness, as if that isn't a political judgement in itself?

Is there even a good answer on how to draw legislative districts in a two party system?

And don't even get me started on the problems with one man, one vote.

Harry, Get Well Soon

Vice President Cheney accidentally shot a friend while quail hunting over the weekend and you'd think something of national import happened. I guess it was a slow weekend in the Natalie Holloway case. The VP's tardiness in notifying the media -- the 22 hour gap -- is driving some people bonkers. What difference did the delay make? None has been offered, so I'm left with nothing but Ecclesiastes: Vanity, Vanity, all is Vanity.

I realize that the best way for the VP to have handled the situation from a PR standpoint was to have immediately notified the press, made a tearful apology on camera, and in general treat it as more important than Iran getting nukes. But really, should I care that the VP accidentally shot a fellow hunter? And who should the VP apologize to besides Harry Whittington, the man he shot? He didn't shoot the American people, so why does he owe us an apology? If all we want is to hear Cheney's apology to Whittington, what do I make of all this outrage over the NSA listening to private conversations?

OK , I do think at least one important question has been raised by this "scandal". Why is that preening doofus David Gregory on NBC's payroll? I had no problem with quantum physics, but I'm completely stumped by that one.

Actually, the handling by Cheney may not be so bad as people are saying. For one thing, the press corps has predictably behaved so wretchedly that they are sharing the spotlight with him. And he's built interest in the interview he's going to do, so this way he only has to apologize on camera once. And thirdly, all of us who think of ourselves as laconic he-men admire the way he's taken the laconic he-man approach to this. My inner laconic he-man has been stirred so much by the VP since since he and the President called New York Times reporter Adam Clymer a major league asshole (and of course the left was up in arms over that bit of truth telling) and Cheney alone told Senator Pat Leahy "'intercourse' you" when Pat was trying to play nice in private after blasting him in public. Laconic He-men are the same in private as in public, and expect other people to be the same.

I miss the Clinton presidency. Now there were real scandals and issues. Take eavesdropping on international calls. Every President since Alexander Graham Bell has done it, and every President, including Saint Jimmy, since FISA was inacted has said they still had the right to eavesdrop on international calls under the constitution. In other words, old news. But when Clinton was President, we got to see the claim resolved that per executive privelege Presidents should be immune to any non-Presidential lawsuits while President. Illegal wars? Heck, President Bush has congressional authorization. President Clinton had nothing when we pre-emtively attacked Serbia over Kosovo. Secrecy? Have you forgotten Hillary Care so soon? Maybe the VP should explain he grew up hunting with his father and all questions will cease. Hey, it worked when Hillary explained how she was able to make so much money in futures. I pity the Democrats who have so little to work with.

Alito Confirmed

In the category of unsurprising is the collapse of the fillibuster against Judge Alito and his confirmation. Only ardent leftists living inside the media bubble thought it was going to happen any other way.

The only real question is why Alito was confirmed 58-43 and Ginsberg 96-3. She wasn't the more qualified candidate; Republicans voted on ability, Democrats on politics.

VDS

I have pondered over why the left in this country favors wars that meet two simple criteria: (1) spill little or preferably no American blood and (2) do not involve anything that anyone would consider a vital national interest. So we intervene in Haiti or the Balkans without the anti-war left causing much stir. I've always found it odd that the anti-republican-war-left which always has such an exaggerated concern for the welfare of American Soldiers hasn't the slightest concern for foriegn civilians if the above criteria are met. And I think the reason is that they really do fear a "Vietnam quagmire" in every war, so it's vitally important to pick wars that don't cause American casualties (apparently the only benchmark of a quagmire) and wars from which we can just run away and not suffer any repurcussions.

Vietnam sure seems to be a turning point because before then the Democratic party had no trouble with warriors as president - men who weren't afraid to pay any price, bear any burden in the cause of Truth, Justice, and the American way, guys like Kennedy, Truman, Roosevelt, Wilson, Polk, and old Andrew Jackson himself. These guys spent blood and treasure in wars they thought vital to the national interest. Scoop Jackson was the last major Democrat politician of that tradition. As the generation that experience Vietnam fades away, I hope the Democratic party can get over the trauma and return to the American mainstream - the best government is the result of the competition between two fundamentally sound parties.

Isn't It Bliss, Don't You Approve

So how do I dislike the Alito hearings? Let me count the ways.

1. Ted Kennedy Any claim that I need to take Ted Kennedy seriously is an offense. The fact that Massachusetts returns the broken down old drunk to the senate every six years is the best indication that the power of incubency is too strong in American politics. Ted, the man's name is A-li-to, not Al-i-o-to. And for the record , it was Arlen Spector demonstrated who the real the 'lion in winter' is.

2. The Hypocrisy I'll just pick one big example so as not to bore you. The Senate Democrats tell me I need to worry that an organization Judge Alito was a member of 40 years ago, Concerned Alumni of Princeton, was racist and sexist. OK, but how about Robert Byrd? He was not only a member of the Klu Klux Klan, which pretty much set the standard for racist organizations, he was a leader in it. And he still calls people "nigger". And none of those Democratic senators has the slightest problem with Senator Byrd.

3. The Confirmation Process Confirmation hearings mix grotesque grandstanding with mud throwing by one set of partisans and mud removal by the other set of partisans in equal proportions, which leaves no time for an actual exchange of information with the confirmee. But when senators, who control the confirmation process, complain about the process like it's something they have no control over, excuse me if I wretch and wretch again.

4. The Intellectual Dishonesty A significant segment of the left is always going on about how the Constitution is a living document that adapts to the needs of the present. How does it adapt? Well, nine people in Washington, AKA the Supreme Court, get to decide. And by golly if they say that the constitution has spoken to them in a new way, or that the American people have changed, well then, the Constitutionality of an issue has changed. So what's up with this sudden devotion to stare decisis? How can a living document breath if it is put in the straitjacket of stare decisis? But what's worse, it's clear that approval/disapproval for someone holding such a position has nothing to do with traditional measures like judicial temperament, philosophy, or ability, but has everything to do with the person's politics. Because what's clear is you expect, even demand, that Supreme Court justices follow their own feelings and preferences, because that's what this whole living document hooha is about. So the whole point of a confirmation hearing isn't about finding out if a nominee is fit, but flinging so much dirt at a nominee of the other party that enough sticks to derail the confirmation. That and time on TV.

Lynn Swann For Governor

So Lynn Swann is running for Governor of Pennsylvania. Good for him. As a Republican. Hope he's treated better by the Mediocrats party than JC Watts was.

You Can't Handle The Truth

So, President Bush has finally decided to go after those Democrats who are smearing him by claming he lied or mislead about the intellegence on Iraq in order to drum up support for the war. It will be an uphill battle because not only will he have to contend with the Democrats, but the news media as well. The Democrats aren't that formidable a foe, but the news media is much, much smoother at lies and misrepresentations. Good luck Mr. President, you'll need it.

Law Reform

My biggest complaint with the civil justice system isn't the system itself, but us. You know, Americans. We're the ones who have adopted the idea that anything, and I mean anything can be litigated. Everything is open for review by fifteen strangers: twelve people of the street, two paid advocates, and a judge. There is no aspect of human interaction - business, personal, intimate, property - that can't be hauled into a court at a later date for a do over. You may be thinking great, we need more oversight. But there is a penalty for all this, both in terms of direct costs paid to the practitioners and the opportunity costs in changed behavior. And our civil system doesn't even protend to be speedly like our criminal system. Cases can drag on for years, which means that not only is everything subject to review, but it can be years before anything is final. That surely has to be a big drag on invention, risk taking, and business in general.

Another facet of the problem is that when you have breakthroughs in technology or science, everyone benefits. When you have breakthroughs in finance, everyone benefits as improved financial helps new ventures get financed. These breakthroughs are driven by the quality and number of people involved in these fields. But when it comes to law, it seems that breakthroughs there only benefit lawyers, which only increases the attraction to a field that is way over represented and talented in America. The explosion in class action lawsuits hasn't done a thing for the average person -- if anything it's hurt them overall, but it sure has made a bunch of lawyers wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice.

It used to be that farsighted rulers would periodically reform the legal code (Hammurabi was the first recorded). I know the legislatures across the land are too busy with far more sexy and immediate stuff, but I think we're getting to the point that we really need to consider the kind of top to bottom overhaul to rein in the reach of lawsuits and combine it with a wholesale pruning of government regulation. But that won't happen until we demand it. Just having a "business friendly" Supreme Court Justice doesn't cut it.

Thinking Out Loud

It's the consensus view that if Roe Vs. Wade were to be overturned, abortion rights would then move back to the states. I read it all the time, and law bloggers don't even discuss it, it's just assumed. But I wonder. How exactly would it be overturned? Would a majority say, sorry, we got it wrong, those pesky penumbras and eminations are so hard to decipher, a right to privacy doesn't cover going out and having a medical proceedure? Or more likely, would the court have to find a right of the unborn that is more compelling than the mother's right to privacy? And if that were the case, would it really go back to the state legislatures, or would abortion then be unconstitutional, and thus beyond the reach of the states?

California, Gays, Marriage

And in other news, the California legislature has redefined marriage to be between two persons. Governor Schwarzenegger has to sign the bill for it to take effect. I hope he doesn't. But at least the process is right - no judge's fiat, no official ignoring the law.

UPDATE: Governor Schwarzenegger has said he will veto the bill because it conflicts with an initiative passed in 2000 that prevents California from recognizing same sex marriages performed in other states. I suppose the Governor is sensitive to such initiatives since they have formed the backbone of his programs in California. It could also just be cover for a political decision that he would like to avoid.

Break Out The Black Arm Bands

Note to Justice John Paul Stevens: pull your head out of your butt:

"Home and business owners' contention that economic development doesn't qualify as public use "is supported by neither precedent nor logic," Justice John Paul Stevens wrote for the majority. "

Stevens added that "because that plan unquestionably serves a public purpose, the takings challenged here satisfy the public use requirement of the Fifth Amendment."

I'm not a big fan of Justice O'Conner, but she got it right in her dissent:

In a strongly worded dissenting opinion, O'Connor wrote that the majority's decision overturns a long-held principle that eminent domain cannot be used simply to transfer property from one private owner to another.

"Today the Court abandons this long-held, basic limitation on government power," she wrote. "Under the banner of economic development, all private property is now vulnerable to being taken and transferred to another private owner, so long as it might be upgraded -- i.e., given to an owner who will use it in a way that the legislature deems more beneficial to the public -- in the process."

The effect of the decision, O'Connor said, "is to wash out any distinction between private and public use of property -- and thereby effectively to delete the words "for public use" from the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment."

We're replacing bedrock rights clearly in the constitution like private property and replacing them stretches like the right to abortion, the right to healthcare and the right to free school lunches. A terrible day for the constitution, and more shredding, foot wiping, and overturning than John Ashcroft has ever done and will ever do.

BooYa!

Stanford students are big on word compression - reducing words to their first syllable. So Memorial Church becomes MemChu, Memorial Auditorium becomes MemAud, and Hoover Tower becomes HooTow. I think we can use this to predict politics. For instance, George Bush would become GeBu but John Kerry would become JoKe. Hillary Clinton would become HillClin, but Howard Dean would become HowDe (with Doody invariably added). Okay, maybe the analysis is not up to the standards of a MicBar, but fun for me anyway.

Speaking of John Kerry, did you notice that although his grades were ever so slightly lower than Bush's, it's always reported that they were similar or nearly identical. Would the headline have been the same if they had been ever so slightly higher? Anyway, JoKe has a good explanation of why.

Speaking of Howard Dean, maybe HowDe should just go back to the all purpose "yeaghhhh!!!" instead of saying anything else.

Here Come the Judges

I guess I'm the only political junkie in America who neither knows who won or lost in the great judicial compromise of 2005 nor cares. OK, that's not entirely accurate. But as I've said before, judges have only become an issue because we have allowed judicial activism to subvert the bedrock of representative government (that's a fancy way of saying judges have become an unelected force unto themselves that make sweeping decrees based on their own personal feelings while ignoring the clear desires of the people as expressed through referendums and legislation). And while judges do from time to time uphold their important role of safeguarding the minorty or upholding unpopular but necessary principles, all too often it's just a naked power grab for their own viewpoint. So frankly to me the whole fight is over the wrong issue, who gets appoint the tyrants, and not curbing the tryant's power.

Like all agreements with no enforcement power, who wins or loses depends largely on how much each group honors the agreement, and how much real agreement there was. For instance, the agreement is filibuster only in "extreme circumstances"? So what does that mean exactly - in the case of Supreme Court nominees, or in the case of "extreme" nominees with the determination of "extreme" up to who? And what if there is a difference of opinion as to what constitutes extreme circumstances, who adjucates and enforces the agreement? The merry band of 14 senators? On balance I'd say the Republicans came out on top as they have judges in hand in return for hazy future promises. Even with the lack of spine (or ruthlessness) demonstrated repeatedly by Republican senators historically, they managed to kick the can down the road as far as a showdown the electorate would notice while getting appointees who have languished for years finally approved.

Money and Judges

The fight over judges seems to me like the earlier fight over money in politics. We have a similar situation where once people didn't care that much, but now they do. It seems to me that the change in attitude is caused by a change in power. As long as politics didn't matter all that much to one's daily life, there wasn't that much money involved. But as the federal government changed into a 500 lb gorilla that touched everyone's daily life, and every business, money came pouring in. And trying to stop the money flow without changing the power structure is like trying to repeal gravity.

And I see the same thing in the fight over judges. The real issue is that all of a sudden judges matter. They aren't just a bunch of boring old guys in black robes; they are running school districts, defining the meaning of is, involved in elections, ultimately mandating goodness and/or evil. Is abortion really a constitutional right? Only as long as 5 particular judges say so. Can minors and the mentally deficient be executed? That isn't a concern of the governed, nor of their representatives in the legislature, that's a decision for judges. On and on it goes. And so now the fight is on because it's something worth fighting about.

Wise Words

Eugene Volokh picks up on a commentary by Burt Neuborn in The Nation about the left's (or progressive's) addiction to the court system where he warns that simply relying on the courts to render verdicts rather than persuading people is a mistake. I have to agree - the long term battle ground is hearts and minds, not 5 particular justices. And he picks three good examples - abortion, gay rights, and separation of church and state.

One of the things that irks me when discussing abortion rights is people who begin and end with "it's a constitutional right" period. Yeah, because 5 people said so, not on anything actually in the constitution mind you, but based on emanations from the penumbra of the Bill of Rights. I don't know what that literally means in a legal sense, nobody does, but in practice it means a majority of the Supreme Court can hand down any ruling they want and it's the law of the land. Not only is it non-persuasive, it's infuriating. There are other arguments for abortion, which I don't think beat the arguments against, but some of them are at least somwhat persuasive and not at all infuriating.

Quite frankly there is a danger if many important descision is usurped from the people and their elected representatives and made by the judiciary -- it destroys representative government with its art of compromise and softening the rough edges and makes politics a winner-take-all match between two sides that are dedicated to packing the judiciary with their own.

I'll go an example further - the famous Brown vs. Board of Education case that "ended" segregation in schooling. Only it didn't end segregation - public schools are still separate and unequal, only more unequal which is more important. Predominately black schools in the city of St. Louis are as a practical matter far worse now that they were in 1954.

And that's an important fact - there are limits to what laws can do, much more so that the limits on what majority culture can do.

What Njal Said

Donald Sensing takes up Tom Bevan's Op Ed that asks, among other things:

If one is convinced of the moral strength of the argument for saving Terri Schiavo (which millions upon millions of Americans are), and if one further adheres to the proposition that every innocent life is worth protecting and that we as a society must not countenance a system that results in the death of a single innocent soul, are we not then obligated to reconsider support of the death penalty under all circumstances except those in which confessions have been given voluntarily?

I'm a death penalty agnostic, but I don't buy this argument as a reason not to have a death penalty. Here's where it falls apart: "a society must not countenance a system that results in the death of a single innocent soul". Very few systems any human society sets up can make this claim, and certainly none that involves dealing death itself. It simply is an impossible standard, and to set it up foolishness. Set up a system that takes the fewest innocent lives is workable, but any is impossible.

And when I say any system, I pretty much mean any system. Our transportation system kills the innocents at an absolutely ferocious rate - 40,000 in cars and trucks a year in the US alone. Airplanes and trains are killers too. Horsedrawn vehicles, heck horses themselves were killers before mechanical transportation means came into effect. Energy - between coal miners killed, gas explosions, deaths at refineries etc. it too is a killer. Or how about something as mundane as keeping clean - people are killed in showers and tubs every year. And don't get me started on how many buckets kill kids every year. You might argue that since the purpose of these systems isn't to kill people, we should be more forgiving of such outcomes, but isn't that exactly backward?

Now go back to criminal justice, and you'll find that there are far more innocents locked up than executed. Why nobody worries about that is beyond me; why a life time wrongfully in prison being raped is nothing to care about yet wrongful execution, whoa, can't have that is beyond me.

The real standard is to minimize the undesirable effects, and death of the innocent is hugely undesirable. It's something that should and can always be worked on, but there is no absolute possible. We often say that our justice system is designed to let 10 criminals go free rather than wrongly convict 1 innocent person; yet we don't say we let every criminal go free rather than wrongly convict any innocent person -- because it not only sounds absurd, it is absurd. And yet that's the standard that is raised here.

After winding his way through other knotty problems (it should be remembered that the original knotty problem was solved by one of the original applications of thinking outside the box: the application of a sword to cut instead of fingers to untie) he formulates his larger question:

At its core, the dilemma is this: At what point are we forced to live within the law even if we disagree morally with some of the outcomes resulting from its application?

Now we have a good question. I don't know that I'd call it a dilemma as that implies a single decision whereas I think this kind of issue is neither a single decision nor a decision alone. As I said before, any system implemented by man is going to have problems, so I take it as a given that I will morally disagree with some of the outcomes of our legal system. And here my options aren't to only live within or without the law, but to try and change the outcomes and the very law itself. I would argue that it is my moral obligation to try and change outcomes and the law itself in those cases where I think the outcomes are wrong.

Frankly, I think a better question would be phrased:

At what point am I forced to live outside the law because I disagree morally with some of the outcomes resulting from its application.

In other words, at what point does my working within the law, because that should be my default position, become itself wrong? I think the answer my friend varies from person to person. The Declaration of Independence is one attempt to answer that question; I have to be thankful to our forefathers to bequeath a system of government where I don't have to rebel to effect changes in our laws.

Usurpers and Destroyers

I'm a death penalty agnostic; I still struggle with the issue. If I were in a voting booth with the stark choice before me: Abolish the death penalty, yes or no, I don't know how I'd vote (as I've written before). Oddly enough, the case that gives me pause, the case where I say to myself, "if anybody deserves the death penalty, it's this guy" -- that's the case that first the Missouri Supreme Court reduced the penalty from death and now the U.S. Supreme Court upheld that reduction in penalty. And I'm really unhappy with both courts -- not about what they ruled but how and why. I'm not alone in that -- if you think judicial decisions are all dry and windy dissertations without feeling, Justice Scalia's dissent will disabuse you of that notion rather quickly.

I'm unhappy because of the MSC decision in the first place because it ran directly counter to the precedent of the USSC. In the words of Justice Scalia:

To add insult to injury, the Court affirms the Missouri Supreme Court without even admonishing that court for its flagrant disregard of our precedent in Stanford. Until today, we have always held that "it is this Court's prerogative alone to overrule one of its precedents." State Oil Co. v. Khan, 522 U. S. 3, 20 (1997). That has been true even where " 'changes in judicial doctrine' ha[ve] significantly undermined" our prior holding, United States v. Hatter, 532 U. S. 557, 567 (2001) (quoting Hatter v. United States, 64 F. 3d 647, 650 (CA Fed. 1995)), and even where our prior holding "appears to rest on reasons rejected in some other line of decisions," Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/